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Are we (as the Board and Card Game StackExchange) too broad in defining ourselves?
I know I'm way behind on all of this, but as I just found StackExchange last week, I'm hoping for some slight forgiveness.
I'm concerned that the topic Board and Card Games, as it currently exists, consists of what could be 3 distinct exchanges:

Board Games (including: "German" style boardgames and Cooperative boardgames)
Traditional Games (including: Strategic games, Traditional Card games, and Traditional boardgames)
Supremely Overpriced Collectables Games (including: Minature wargames (including the preparation of miniatures/terrain/etc) and Collectible Card Games)

My concern is that while all three of those things are correctly defined by the current definition of Board and Card Games, the only true connection between them is that they are played at a table, without computers, and are NOT roleplaying games.
While in both Arqade and Role-playing Games (and all the other exchanges I've seen) there are a variety of subjects to discuss, they are limited to one overarching theme. You go to Arqade for video game questions, you go to Role-playing Games for (table-top) role-playing game questions. You go to Board and Card Games for... any board and/or card game related question?

I do realize that what I've just written doesn't constitute a question at all, and are just thoughts that I am having, so I guess here is my question:
In the long run, does this stackexchange want to be open to all sorts of questions that it is currently open to, or does it want more specificity than that?

Specifically what is your concern? Is there some actual problem currently, or are you just thinking in future? Either way, I don't see a problem, and tagging is helpful.

It's hard to really pin down what your actual concern is from your question, but maybe I can provide some perspective that will be helpful. Please note that this is not an official Stack Exchange response. I'm just an (unelected) moderator of this site, and a SE user of some experience.
Executive Summary
It's essential for a site's success to have a broad user base. Critical mass is everything. A user should expect to be interested in some small subset of the total remit of a site. A site should be as wide as possible, but no wider. It's not necessary to make hard delineations between sites. It is not yet known how to correctly decompose knowledge between sites, but there are some hypotheses, and the experiments are underway.
Rationale
How do we know where to draw the boundaries of an SE site? That's a tricky question, with lots of grey areas. The Stack Exchange approach has been to "try it and see": proposals are made at Area 51, people try and refine scope, and if they reach critical mass, they launch. Importantly, these proposals, and the subsequent implemented sites, need not be distinct sets.
For example, a question about the programmer's text editor Vim might be on topic on Stack Overflow, Unix and Linux, and Ask Ubuntu. This is because knowledge in the real world has fuzzy boundaries, and doesn't fit into a strict hierarchy, as ontologists and the field of AI has come to learn the hard way, over a period of many years.
Board and Card Games itself has overlap. We allow questions about computer implementations of board games, even though these are also on topic at Arqade. We also overlap with the Poker, Chess and Go sites (the latter now defunct, and merged with B&CG). There is significant disagreement within the SE community about whether or not these distinct sites are necessary, what we gain or lose by merging, etc. etc. There are no easy answers.
So the real question is what does a site's scope gain us? The key here is community. You want a critical mass of quality contributors who can ask and answer questions well, so that the site can become self-sustaining, while generating high-quality content.
In your question you define three broad areas of game, and imply that there isn't much overlap between them. I disagree. People that like board games often play many different kinds of games. Take a look at the answers of our top contributors to see that demonstrated. The connecting thread here is the gaming - how to define interesting problems or representations of the world, and how to solve them well.
We make a distinction with video games, because the nature of the gaming, and the community, is completely different. We make a distinction with roleplaying, because while there is a fuzzy boundary, the big concerns of serious open-ended roleplaying games are significantly different (e.g. character development, immersiveness, creativity) from most board games.
Vocal communities for chess, poker, go, and even magic-the-gathering have all argued that they are 'special', that their game is particularly deep, that they are largely uninterested in other board games, and that experts will shun a site which does not exclusively cater to their game. Others (including myself) have argued that these sites are too narrow to succeed, that the Stack Overflow model proves that disjoint topics can co-exist, and that tags provide the customised user view. Stack Exchange is essentially doing the experiment.
The Magic proposal was shut, and all questions redirected here. That appears to have been very successful. The Go site was launched, but didn't have enough momentum. Its questions were folded in to this site, and rendering software for Go boards has been enabled for us. The Chess and Poker sites continue to exist in Beta for now, but have their own challenges, just as we do.
I think the key to a successful SE site scope is to be as wide as possible, but no wider. Stack Overflow has great scope because it allows any programmer to ask any technical question about programming, in any language. Arqade works because it covers all video games, on all platforms. I think Board and Card Games works because it covers all aspects of all board and card games.
It's really important to understand that most of the users of these sites don't interact with most of the questions! We all have our niches. On Stack Overflow, I only care about the two or three programming languages I use regularly. On Arqade, I completely ignore questions about Xbox games. I don't have the console, I can't answer them, and they aren't relevant to me.
Finally, I'll note that site scope is a work in progress. It's meta discussions here that help us to define what is and isn't acceptable, and that definition can and will evolve over time. For now, I see no argument for increased specificity. The site is working well, and the key for us to be launched is more users, not less.

I'm just an (unelected) moderator of this site, and a SE user of some experience. Don't sell yourself short, I&C! I would never have asked you to step up if I hadn't seen something extra-special in you. A post like this only reinforces why we modded you. :)

"I completely ignore questions about Xbox games," is this possible. I thought the great Meta-Tag purge removed all system specific tags. I personally have no interest in modern platforms, that is why I am following the retro games and modding proposal specifically because I cannot easily follow NES/Atari2600/AppleIIe/C64/Genesis questions (I suppose I could ignore skyrim, MW, WoW tags)

Although I realize now I was simply repeating a discussion that has been in existance since this.SE and SE at large, it's good to know that I'm not the only one thinking about it.


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2016: Moderation Stats
There is a post on meta stack overflow that shows the moderation stats on the site for the year. Would it be possible to get something similar to that for this site?
When I inquired about it I was instructed to make a feature request post on the meta where I would like to see the stats.
I figure they would be interesting to see.

source: Stack Exchange

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

sort: votes


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Requirements to view Board and Card Games StackExchange Website
I have recently found this website and wished to share the particular questions pertaining to Bridge with a friend of mine in the UK so I sent them the following link but they said it wouldn't work. Is this because it is in Beta at the moment, is it a country specific website or something else?
link used:
https://boardgames.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/bridge

What happened -- did your friend get a 404 (page not found), or did it fail in some other way?

Was there any downtime recently?

Apparently it just timed out. As for downtime, I have no idea.

I suggested finding Stack Exchange through google but that timed out too

The Beta is public, and available to all. It doesn't even require a log in. And Stack Exchange doesn't filter based on country.
Your friend's problem is downstream. Corporate firewall, or perhaps overzealous parental controls?
You can always take a look at http://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/ if you aren't sure if a site is up.

If the link is currently available to your friend, but wasn't before, then it might have been because of database issues that occurred recently. Checking StackStatus.net

Database Issue Feb. 5th 2013
Our primary SQL Server experienced a “non yielding scheduler” and wrote a 234 GB memory dump to disk before restarting. During this time all sites were offline. After the crash dump completed SQL was able to start without issue. We will continue to monitor the server and have plans to switch all of our sites back over to NY this weekend which are running on fully patched SQL 2012 instances. Stay tuned…

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


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Of-topic: Computer game support
The on-topic areas for computer game (for games with a board game version) related questions needs to be updated to account for computer support related questions. Questions dealing with hardware, software or general user interface support would be better served on a site that is designed to help with computer games in general. Questions that deal with use of features that are solely in the real of the digital world are hard to relate back to the physical realm and can be harder to ensure that we have expert advice on a site dedicated to the physical game.
Here are some examples of questions that should be off topic on this site.
Examples borrowed from this meta post

Meta-gameplay (how to play, outside the actual game): These are questions where the answer is going to change over time and are likely to change as new versions of the game are released. This can leave an answer that is only applicable to an older version of the game that is not available anymore.

How to play multiplayer Ticket to Ride (iOS/ipad) with friends over the internet?
How can I "censor" players on the IGS server?
"Where do I enter the password to join a private multiplayer game?"

Meta-game (about the game, outside of actually playing): As with the prevous questions they are likely to get out of date quickly and depending on the question involved outside variables such as OS/Driver updates could lead to answers only working depending on the setup of the user in question.

Is older MTG Online client not supported any more?
Scrabble computer version that uses the new dictionary? (OSPD4/OTCWL2)
"Does the UI scale well to both tablets and phones?"

As a policy discussion, this tends to be better raised as a question (e.g. "are computer game support questions off topic?") with your stance expressed as a single answer. Otherwise, we are forced into a dilemma if we find the discussion helpful but not that particular stance.

@doppelgreener Since this is tagged [meta-tag:feature-request] and describes some things that "should be off topic", I assume that it is a request that this topic be made off-topic, not a discussion about whether it already is. It is perfectly reasonable to write such a question.

I've suggested this before, and it was not well received.

It's not a duplicate. Suggesting that a rule should change is not a duplicate of asking what the rule is.

Generally feature request is supposed to mean changed to the site's functionality, things that would require action from the dev team. Discussion works fine here; it's a proposal/discussion about a policy change.

I'm retagging this with Discussion, because it's not a feature request, and I agree Discussion is quite appropriate.

I don't see anything to gain from this change or any new motivation to reconsider our policy, so I think things are fine as-is.
Your concerns here don't seem to be borne out by much evidence. We don't get many of these questions, but they tend to get answered as well as any other questions. The people who play computer versions of board games tend to be people who play board games in general, so our site is a good place to look for an answer. Sure, there's some overlap with Arqade, but that's normal: there's never a clean dividing line between sites. We can help with these questions and it's fair to put board games and computer versions of them under the same umbrella, so it'd take extraordinary evidence that they'd perform better elsewhere to motivate this change.
And helping people with these questions doesn't stop us from helping people with questions about physical board games. It's fine if some questions don't interest everyone. I know pretty much nothing about bridge, but I don't mind if bridge players discuss all kinds of detailed, esoteric bridge questions. It's still good for the site to have those questions and those users. I'm all for the goals of more questions, more users, and more board games, but I don't think a slight reduction in scope is a step in that direction.
If we'd seen problems with these questions going unanswered, or if they were overwhelming the site, then maybe we'd have something  bigger to discuss. But this policy seems to still make sense, it seems to be working fine, we've seen support on meta when we've checked in previously, and the small amount of voting on this question doesn't indicate a community desire for change. So I'd say it's still a good policy.

As a side note, I also find the "computer game support " label unnecessarily derogatory. We're not at risk of becoming a tech support hotline dealing with endless "have you tried turning it off and on again?" issues. I have the same gut reaction as you to that sort of thing, and would be first in line to fix that problem if it came up, but I don't think it's a fair characterization of these categories of questions.
If these are computer game support questions, then a ton of our other questions are board game support questions. This is just about whether we take questions about computer versions of board games in the same way as board games in general. We take meta-gameplay and meta-game questions about physical games too, and don't dismiss them as support questions or see them as less useful. We should treat computer versions of board games the same, especially since there's not actually a terribly clear dividing line between "real" and "support" anyway.


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Single tag wiki - Multiple games
Recently I encountered a tag wiki that was edited to have information about two different games from two different publishers and the edit was approved. There is currently an edit suggestion that is to correct the situation by creating a new tag for the second game. The tags in question are evolution and evolution-origin.
When a tag edit is suggested that is combining multiple unrelated items into one what is the proper procedure for fixing them?
The edits in question are:
https://boardgames.stackexchange.com/review/suggested-edits/14579
https://boardgames.stackexchange.com/review/suggested-edits/14580

I wish I'd seen this meta post before. I created [tag:evolution-origin] and retagged the new question pretty much on autopilot. One tag for two games seemed harmful so I acted quick to prevent further harm.

@freekvd This meta post was created in response to the tag being edited for two games and the work that was done to fix the error. I figured it would be a good thing to bring up for the future.

In general, a tag should not refer to two separate games, especially if those games are completely unrelated. So, an edit that makes a single tag refer to two different games is incorrect, and if such an edit is made, it should be rolled back like any other incorrect edit.
In this particular case, we have an unusual situation where a new game has a stronger claim to an existing tag than the current game does. In this case, we have a few reasonable options:

Tag the new game with evolution-2014, or something similar. This would mean that the tag name is an artifact of the order in which the tags are created, which is suboptimal but workable.
Tag the new game with evolution-2014, then have the moderators rename evolution -> evolution-origin and evolution-2014 -> evolution. This would make the tags more closely match the game titles, but it's more of a pain to implement.
Tag the new game with evolution and retag questions about the old game to evolution-origin, then update the tag wikis to match. This has the downside of having the tag wikis be temporarily incorrect.

It looks like there are a grand total of three questions tagged, so we can easily retag everything to get the desired state without needing synonymization. Also for completeness, the tag wiki excerpts should probably have something like "for Evolution: The Origin of Species, see [tag:evolution-origin]".

That would definitely work too. The primary benefit of my suggestions is that they don't have the period between retagging and the tag wiki corrections getting approved when the tag wikis are incorrect. Of course, for such low volume tags, it doesn't really make much of a difference.

We can edit tag wikis directly (you only need 4k rep) so there's not really much delay to worry about. I'd have done it already if I were sure which tags we wanted.

Oh, I thought you also needed a specific minimum score in the tag to edit the tag wiki without review.

4k users have a lot of extra priviliedges.

FWIW, I wouldn't change an existing tag to refer to a newer game unless there was a much larger amount of questions for the newer game.

@PatLudwig I would have to agree with not changing an existing tag.

In a case like this where a tag is edited to add a second game, or if another game has a better claim to the tag the following steps should be done to solve the issue.

In the case of a tag edit it should be rejected/rolled back as needed
A post on wiki should be made describing the issue and listing the reasons for which game should get the original tag and which should get a new tag. It could also be that both games get a new tag. With preference being given to the first game to have the tag and also considering the number of questions for each game.
After a consensus is made any changes to the old tag should be worked on by the community (moderator also depending on size of work) and new tags should be created and put on the needed questions.

I think this path will help in the future when multiple games could lay claim to the same tag.


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How do we enter Go Boards on this site?
I had asked a question (now deleted) on meta.stackexchange about a Go-version of stackexchange. https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/164930/go-stackexchange-com
It was already tried http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/11942/game-of-go which closed, so I wanted to try asking questions on here.
They also mentioned a javascript library for encoding go boards which may have been implemented on here already.  And I wanted to know how that works.
The long term goal, would be to use this existing site to host questions, and maybe it can become standard for American go players.

go questions are most welcome here. In fact, the Go site that you mention was merged with this site. As you can see here, a number of interesting Go questions have been asked and answered here.
We support graphical Go boards through custom markup. This is described here. Here is an example of a rendered board, used in a question: Why did black avoid the straightforward capture here?

You can code diagrams of as much of a board as you want, with a maximum of 10 numbered moves and various highlights and letters. This function only works on the main site, not here on meta. Alternatively you can upload an image (Ctrl-G or see the help).
Notation
A diagram has to be formatted as a “code block”, i.e. indented by four spaces, which may be done using Ctrl-K or the {} button on the edit toolbar. Be sure to include blank lines before and after a diagram; one also seems to need normal text lines between diagrams. After a short pause, if a diagram is correctly coded, it should appear properly formatted in the preview (except here on meta).
The notation used in diagrams is a subset of that used by Sensei’s Library; the simplest features may be learnt from the samples below.
The notation is specified in: https://senseis.xmp.net/?HowDiagramsWork,
but arrows and lines appear not to be supported here.
On any of their pages, click the Edit Page button to view or copy the code for the diagrams.
There is also a description of the notation here: https://lifein19x19.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=226 – but note that the [go]…[/go] tags are not used on this site. That page also has places to click to show the code for the examples, which is handy for cut & paste.
This answer reports that support for diagrams has been introduced, but gives little help: https://boardgames.meta.stackexchange.com/a/642/14474
The tag-wiki also summarises the notation (and refers here).
Stones, points and marks

White stone: O; with circle: W, square: @, triangle: Q, cross: P
Black stone: X; with circle: B; square: #, triangle: Y, cross: Z
Empty point: .; with circle: C, square: S, triangle: T, cross: M;  hoshi: ,; letters:a–z; blank: _
Borders & corners: - / | / + (outside the playing area)
Numbered stones: 1–9, then 0 (the highest possible), starting with 1 or a number you specify after m in the header line.

Tools
Herman Hiddema has a very intuitive tool to create diagram code interactively: http://hiddema.nl/diagrammer/
Sensei’s Library offers a tool to convert SGF files to diagrams:http://senseis.xmp.net/tools/sgf2diagram.php.
Tips
As already mentioned, there are many possibilities for cut & paste using samples here, on the main site or elsewhere.
If editing a whole-board diagram, you may find it helpful to expand the edit box (drag the bottom down) and zoom your browser out (e.g. Ctrl-- in Firefox) so as to see all your code and the result at the same time.
Please use the c (show coordinates) option if people are likely to want to refer to points on the board in comments.
References in text
Note that Unicode includes a few handy characters, which you can cut and paste from here:

⓿ ❶❷❸❹❺❻❼❽❾❿ ⓫⓬⓭⓮⓯⓰⓱⓲⓳⓴
  ⓪  ①②③④⑤⑥⑦⑧⑨⑩ ➀➁➂➃➄➅➆➇➈➉ (second group slightly larger)
  ▲△ ◯⬤ note1

Samples

this answer cannot show the results of these samples (unless we upload images), because diagrams are not supported here on meta

Any of the following samples can be pasted into your post as they stand (or all at once!); they are already indented by four spaces as required. Of course an existing question with a similar diagram may also editted to get a
For convenience, here is an almost empty board with only two moves, with a header ‘Bcm1’ meaning black moves first (B), coördinates should be shown (c) and the first move should be numbered 1  (m1). In the rest of the diagram . and , represent normal vacant points and hoshi points respectively; -/+/| all (interchangeably) represent edges; numbered moves from 1 to 10 are coded 1, 2, … 9, 0:
Empty boards
(normal text followed by a blank line)

    $$Bcm1 (title of diagram here)
    $$ +-------------------+
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...2...............|
    $$ |...,.....,.....,1..|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...,.....,.....,...|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...,.....,.....,...|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ |...................|
    $$ +-------------------+

(more normal text preceded by a blank line)

Here is the top left quarter of the board:
    $$Bcm1 (top left)
    $$ +----------
    $$ |..........
    $$ |..........
    $$ |..........
    $$ |...,.....,
    $$ |..........
    $$ |..........
    $$ |..........
    $$ |..........
    $$ |..........
    $$ |...,.....,

And the top right:
    $$Bcm1 (top right)
    $$ ----------+
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ,.....,...|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ,.....,...|

And the bottom left:
    $$Bcm1 (bottom left)
    $$ |...,.....,
    $$ |..........
    $$ |..........
    $$ |..........
    $$ |..........
    $$ |..........
    $$ |...,.....,
    $$ |..........
    $$ |..........
    $$ |..........
    $$ +----------

And the bottom right:
    $$Bcm1 (bottom right)
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ,.....,...|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ..........|
    $$ ,.....,...|
    $$ ----------+

And here are empty 13 x 13 and 9 x 9 boards:
    $$Bcm1 (title of diagram here)
    $$ +-------------+
    $$ |.............|
    $$ |.............|
    $$ |.............|
    $$ |...,.....,...|
    $$ |.............|
    $$ |.............|
    $$ |......,......|
    $$ |.............|
    $$ |.............|
    $$ |...,.....,...|
    $$ |.............|
    $$ |.............|
    $$ |.............|
    $$ +-------------+

    $$Bcm1 (title of diagram here)
    $$ +---------+
    $$ |.........|
    $$ |.........|
    $$ |..,...,..|
    $$ |.........|
    $$ |....,....|
    $$ |.........|
    $$ |..,...,..|
    $$ |.........|
    $$ |.........|
    $$ +---------+

Ear-reddening move
And – largely for fun – here is the ear-reddening move, where X and O stand for unnumbered stones and # for highlighted stones, the move coded 1 is to be numbered White 118 and the three moves after the ear-reddening move (127) are shown as a, b, c:
    $$Wcm118 The ear-reddening move (127)
    $$ ---------------------
    $$ -.........XO1.......-
    $$ -...2ab...XOXO.OOX..-
    $$ -..3O.X..OXXOO.OX...-
    $$ -...,.....,.XXX.,X..-
    $$ -.....4....X....XX..-
    $$ -..O............XOO.-
    $$ -....c........OOOXXX-
    $$ -..............XOOOX-
    $$ -.........0..XOOXXX.-
    $$ -...,.....,..OOX,XO.-
    $$ -..O...........OXXO.-
    $$ -..............OXOX.-
    $$ -............O.OXOO.-
    $$ -..5......#.#O.OX...-
    $$ -......X.9..#OXOXO..-
    $$ -..X,X..X.,.#OOXOO..-
    $$ -.....8OXO.OOXXXXOO.-
    $$ -......6OXOO.OXX.XO.-
    $$ -........7..O.X.X.X.-
    $$ ---------------------

1 These are large circles, normal circles ○● look too small.

My favorite way to enter Go boards is to find an old question with a Go board, enter the edit mode, copy the board and paste it into my new question/answer. (Cancelling the edits on the old question, of course.) That gives a nice starting place for my new diagram.
Sometimes I look for an existing diagram with a set-up similar to what I want to make, but editing them is easy enough that usually I just go with the first one I find. Searching on go is good for finding existing diagrams.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


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Should we keep new user's 'bad' and closed questions at 0?
I have the feelng that this site..
Doesn't have the number of users it should have yet; I think it's very very useful and one day there will be all kinds of publishers, tournamet pro players, casual gamers, poker rockstars..
So I just read..
This question which was closed as it should, that's not to discuss.  But.. are the downvotes beneficial or harmful?
I am a afraid that this kind of welcome to a new user encourages them strongly to never interact again.  Isn't it enough to close the question?
In the long run it's much better to hear from him again, this time in the proper format

I deleted the question.  I missed the first time around that the asker was the one who released the game.  Not disclosing that plainly is a violation of our FAQ.
One downvote comes as a consequence of the question being closed.  There isn't anything we can do about that.
This isn't a forum and we need to strike a balance between guiding new users to asking/answering questions the SE way and being welcoming.  I don't think we should lower our standards to attract new users.  There are plenty of forums out there for people to discuss boardgames.
If we keep doing what we do best, traffic will come.  We've tripled our traffic over the last year, traffic keeps going up.

The system automatically gives one dowvote when the question is closed?

@quinestor - yes, for some closure types.  Looking for a canonical reference.  I believe the -1 comes with everything except Duplicate and off topic closures.

@quinestor - my guess was wrong.  Details here http://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/84978/should-questions-closed-as-not-a-real-question-and-off-topic-get-an-automati


text:
Add a new "retag" tag for new users to request their question be retagged
Last week I asked a question about Phase 10 Twist for which there was no tag.  As someone with low rep, I had no way to formally request that my question be retagged without adding something to the body of the question and hoping someone saw it or flagging the question for moderator attention and adding my request.
Over at Anime.SE we recently added the retag tag for new users who are familiar with the SE format to request their questions be retagged with proper series tag.
I propose that the retag tag be added here as well so that new users have an easy way to request a tag be created without having to post it in the body of the question.

I personally have mixed feelings about this (I see where you're coming from, but to me [retag] looks like a meta-tag) so I'm genuinely interested to see what the rest of this community thinks.

I think this is not really an issue. A significant fraction of these posts come from new users who are unaware of site conventions. Even if we did have a retag tag, most people wouldn't use it.
Modifying the Ask a question page, even if it was possible (which I'm not sure it is), only helps if the user reads the page. Long experience on Stack Overflow has taught us that plenty of people never read anything before posting. Most people just want the answer to a question. Once they get it, some small fraction will become interested, and choose to stick around. Those are the people who will pick up the conventions, over time, but they are a minority.
If a user can't pick the tag they'd like, they can

Mention at the end of the question that they'd like a retag.
Comment on the question, and then delete the comment once someone retags.
Flag the question for moderator attention.
Just pick something arbitrary - we have plenty of users keen to retag correctly (people love tagging and categorising; editing for quality - now that's much rarer).

The question will be retagged quickly. I'd say the system works just fine.

Have to agree. Even if such a tag exists, there's no guarantee any new users would use it (or even know to use it). I think it's the job of higher-rep users to spot incorrect tags and change them as appropriate, whether the question asks for it or not.

+1 and I agree that almost all new users wouldn't do it. But I do wish there could exist a correct tag for a new user to put on the question if it really doesn't fall under any existing tag.

After reading the arguments for and against, I agree that flagging a question or leaving a comment is probably the best course of action.  Even if a retag tag was implemented, it wouldn't occur to most people to use it.

This is as a much a response to @Aarthi's comment as it is the original question:
We've recently, strongly, and (I would say) successfully moved away from meta-tags such as "strategy" and "rules". One of the results is that, for many questions, the name of the game is the only appropriate tag. Glancing at the questions on the front page shows a lot of questions with only one tag (and a few that have two, for a base game and expansion).
MCeley then has an excellent point: if a new user asks a question about a new game, the form requires that it have at least one tag, but what should it be? Something general, like "strategy" is a now-frowned-upon meta tag. The name of the game hasn't been created yet, so a new user can't use it, I think a retag tag is a good solution. My guess is most retags won't last more than 30 minutes before someone creates the appropriate tag.
My biggest concern is that new users won't know to use the retag, and I'd go so far as to ask for an additional feature request: a note on the Ask Question page for users unable to create tags instructing them of this convention.

I've just ran into this problem with this question. I also hail from the Anime SE and have found the retag tag extremely helpful.


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One of my answers got down-voted, and I don't know why
I asked a question.  Then I submitted my own answer to that question because I had an idea and wanted to throw that in to the answer mix, see if I could get any feedback on it.
The answer got down-voted.  That was it.  No comments, no feedback. Nothing.
I don't know if the down-voter was objecting to the answer itself, or the style it was written in, or anything.
I'm fine with being down-voted if it was genuinely a bad answer but I don't know that it is because the voter hasn't commented on it.  I feel cheated without any explanation.
Is there a way to find out who down-voted me so I can ask them why, or is there a way of changing the stackexchange format to 'encourage' people to comment when they down-vote?

I laugh when I see that this question has a single downvote with no explanation.

I can't know for sure why you were downvoted, but if I had to guess, it's because that answer just isn't very good. You happen to be the asker here, but that shouldn't be a factor in how you answer.
If this answer had been submitted by someone else, would it have been downvoted? Probably. Perhaps you yourself would have downvoted it. The answer is a single line. There is no explanation of why it may be a good idea. Why do we expect it to help? What happened when it was playtested? What are the possible shortcomings? Why are you asking another question in your answer?
I understand that you put the idea out there as an answer in order to get feedback. But that's not how the system is intended to work. We don't provide answers hoping for feedback. We provide answers because we think they answer the question. An answer is proposing a solution to a problem, and asking that viewers take the time to read it and consider it. That means that the burden is on the answerer, always, to justify and support their answer, and provide something worthy of being read.
To be clear: the solution (use a D8 house rule) may or may not be good. But the answer is definitely not great.
Maybe an example would help:

Q: How do I find the length of the hypotenuse of a triangle?
A1: Use Pythagoras' theorem.
A2: Guess.

Both of these answers are lousy. Neither has any real content. One happens to actually be a better solution than the other, but a naive reader cannot know that from the answer! A good answer would expand A1 to explain how, or why, or add a diagram, or work through an example case. It might also point out places where this solution would not apply ("if the triangle is not right-angled, options include...").
In the case of your question, since there is nothing substantive to the idea, you could legitimately have included it as part of the question, and someone could comment on its feasibility in their answer. Alternatively, you could remove the 'what do you think?' part, and expand your answer with some content.

thanks for the feedback.  I've attempted to improve my answer and will update it more when I can

There already is a system to encourage people to comment on downvotes.  You really don't want to force people to do so.  My advice is just to not worry about it.  A few downvotes don't have any significant impact on your reputation.  Some people dislike answering a question that you asked.  They're wrong, but there is nothing to stop them from voting that way.  If your question/answer is good, the reputation you gain from it will far outweigh any downvotes.

Unfortunately this person counts for about 1/3 of the voting on my Question/Answer so it makes a difference.  But thanks for the comment on the answer, and I will do as you say, give it ago, and then update my answer accordingly.  Thanks

@E_L: Up votes are worth more than down votes, so you still come out with a net gain in rep.

@E_L, specifically downvotes are worth 1/5th what an upvote is worth.


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Changing "Settlers of Catan" tags due to rebranding as "Catan"
Earlier this year, Settlers of Catan was rebranded so that the name of the game is simply Catan. The expansions were similarly rebranded. For instance, Seafarers of Catan is now called Catan: Seafarers.
We have the tag settlers-of-catan, which is what all questions related to the game are tagged as. At one point, we had a the tag catan that was describing questions for the entire franchise, but that was removed per a meta discussion.
I would like to suggest that we change the tag name to catan, but leave settlers-of-catan as a tag synonym. This way, the tag we have reflects the current name of the game, but there will still be a way for those who are not aware of the name change to find questions for the game. The expansions would be similarly changed: seafarers-of-catan would become catan-seafarers, but with the old name as a tag synonym.
I do not have permissions to make these changes myself, but even if I did, I figured it would be good to bring this up on meta since it is one of the most popular games.

I imagine that a lot of folks will still be searching for Settlers of Catan help. We might rank lower if we shorten the tag name. That said, I care more about site quality than hits from Google. +1 from me.

@Rainbolt Then again, those who go out and buy the game today and have a rules question would be searching simply for "Catan", since that's what their game box says. At any rate, many of the older questions say "Settlers of Catan" in the question title or question text, so people should still be able to find those questions through a search engine.

A score of +5/0 suggests that it's time to make the change. I went ahead and created the Catan tag. I moved the tag Wiki over to the new tag. I do not have sufficient reputation within that tag to suggest a synonym (and I suspect nobody will because I just created it). We really need a moderator to make this change cleanly. And don't forget the expansions as well (I think we have tags for four of them).

Right after I said that, someone downvoted. Maybe they should leave a comment explaining why so the rest of us can discuss.

I wouldn't worry about Google - it's generally pretty capable of synonymization and optionalization.

This seems reasonable to me, but I'd give it a few more days before making any change. Not everyone reads the meta regularly.

It's been a week now since the last comment. Given the number of upvotes, and the fact that nobody who has downvoted has explained their rationale, I think that it's time to make the change.

I've merged settlers-of-catan and catan, and pointed the first as a synonym to the second. catan is now the canonical tag.
I took a quick look at the expansions, but there are a number (and I don't play them often). If you add a list of the expansion name remappings (and a link to the new titles for verification), I'll go ahead and make those too.
Update: I've merged seafarers-of-catan and catan-seafarers, and pointed the first as a synonym to the second. catan-seafarers is now the canonical tag.


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Tags for the games "Village" and "Villages"
There are two games released in 2011, one called Village by eggertspiele and another called Villages by The Game Crafter, LLC. I recently created villages for a question about the latter without incident.
However, we have an untagged question for the former: In Village (2011) are the winning strategies really balanced? Unfortunately, the site won't let me create village for it because it is too close to villages, which now exists.
Would it be possible for someone with the proper privileges to create this tag? Or are there better tag names we should have for the two of them?

Sounds like this is needed

It's done. It appears this required mod privileges.


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Should we have a tag specifically for Friday Night Magic?
Recently, we had a question How can I find a FNM-competitive affordable deck? that was tagged with friday-night-magic. I'm not a Magic player, but I was a little confused by this because it was my understanding that this was just a casual event that stores ran, rather than a specific set of rules (i.e. it's not like mtg-commander, or the RPG event Dungeons & Dragons Adventures). I figured that we could just retag this with tournament, which already is on a number of Magic questions.
There was some disagreement about this in the chat, so I'm bringing this up on meta. Should we have a tag specifically for Friday Night Magic?

Friday Night Magic (FNM) is just an event on Fridays (whodathunk?) that local game stores hold for playing magic. Generally they are a recognized format like Standard, Modern or Commander, and if the store is recognized by Wizards they offer some prize support (promos).  Each store can do FNM how they want, but it ends up being similar between the stores.  As it's a (mostly) casual event (and we don't even have categories for GPs or PTs), I don't think a tag is needed for it.  If anything, since FNMs tend to be at the regular Rules Enforcement Level, that would be a more likely tag, and that is still a bit unnecessary.

I agree, I don't think we need a tag more specific that [tag:tournament], but if we did want one [tag:regular-rel] would be better than [tag:friday-night-magic].


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What naming convention should be used for tags about Arkham Horror and Eldritch Horror expansions?
As the Arkham Horror tag wiki and Eldritch Horror tag wiki shows, there are two naming conventions that are currently being used for expansion tags*:
Early Arkham Horror expansions do not have a prefix

Curse of the Dark Pharaoh curse-of-the-dark-pharaoh

Note that ah-curse-of-the-dark-pharaoh is longer than the allowed 25 characters

Dunwich Horror dunwich-horror
Kingsport Horror kingsport-horror

Later Arkham Horror expansions have an "ah-" prefix

The King in Yellow ah-king-in-yellow
Innsmouth Horror ah-innsmouth-horror
Miskatonic Horror ah-miskatonic-horror

Eldritch Horror expansions do not have a prefix

Mountains of Madness mountains-of-madness
Forsaken Lore forsaken-lore
Under the Pyramids under-the-pyramids
Strange Remnants strange-remnants

What should be the naming convention of these Arkham Horror expansions going forward? And when we reach a consensus, could a mod or high-rep user please migrate tag wikis?
* The Black Goat of the Woods and The Lurker at the Threshold do not currently have tags on this site.

ah-curse-dark-pharaoh we could always shorten it. It'll still come up as people type it so it shouldn't be too bad to find right?

They probably should have the ah- prefix, since as far as I can tell all other games that are an expansion for (or related to) another game have the games name (or abbreviation) as a prefix. Examples: dominion-seaside, catan-seafarers, and mtg-commander
I didn't find any other games that don't fit this pattern (but it is possible I missed something from a game I don't know much about)

The proper names for the expansions you mentioned are Dominion: Seaside and Catan: Seafarers. I'll be honest, I was surprised to look up Dunwich Horror on BGG and find that that the full title is actually Arkham Horror: Dunwich Horror Expansion. So this would be a fair reason to prefix with ah-.

A counter-example are the Eldritch Horror expansion tags, such as [tag:forsaken-lore]. I've gone ahead and added them to the question because they are a related situation for Arkham Horror.

Another counter-example: the Battlestar Galactica expansion tags. There was a meta discussion about how [battlestar-galactica-pegasus] was too long. We would have a problem with [ah-curse-of-the-dark-pharaoh] being too long too.

I suppose [ah-cotdp] could work.


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Should there be a tag for version comparison?
This site currently has a version tag, which has the usage description:

Questions about different versions of the same game.

Some of the questions currently tagged with this are:

What are the differences between Pandemic and Pandemic 2013?
How does Talisman 4th Edition compare with earlier versions?
What are the changes in the Revised Edition of Curse of the Dark Pharaoh?

At one point, What's different in San Juan's second edition? was tagged with this as well, but was removed with the argument that the tag shouldn't exist at all. I figured that rather than having an edit war or a heated discussion between two people, it would be better to seek out community consensus.
Should this site have the tag version?

Yes, keep it (but possibly change to [edition-comparison])
This tag adds value to the site and should stay.
Personally, I enjoy seeing questions about edition comparison and sometimes browse the tag just on its own to get a sense of how games change between editions (I wonder if those in the industry who are considering making a revised version of a game they have already published might find this valuable too).
Aside from that, here's why I think it should stay.
This isn't a meta-tag
The most common argument for removal is that it's a meta-tag, which have been discouraged before this site's creation.

The reason meta-tags are a problem is that they do not describe the content of the question. They describe some other aspect of the question, like the author's skill level, or the author's motivation for asking it, or generally what "kind" of question it is (poll, how-to, etc.).

Unlike tags such as [beginner], this tag does describe the content of the question, which is that it's wanting to know about different versions of the game.
The most commonly cited point from this article is the criteria that "If the tag can't work as the only tag on a question, it's probably a meta-tag." First off, I'd like to point out that it says probably, not automatically. In this case, I believe that a version question does accurately describe the content of the question. It tells us that it is about an aspect of the game (in this case, the comparison between editions) and helps clarify the scope. I think that removing it would be a detriment to the clarity of the question.
For what it's worth, we have a number of tags on this site that also are not able to be standalone, but provide a great deal of value to this site, such as openings, house-rules, variants, kids, and teaching. Other large sites have similar tags, such as Sci-fi/Fantasy SE where [lightsaber] is not a meta tag despite the fact that any questions about it by necessity require [star-wars]. Contrast this with tags like [beginner], [subjective], or [best-strategy], which don't provide a similar description of the question content.
Other established Stack Exchange sites have virtually identical tags

[edition-comparison] on RPG.SE (this is used almost exactly like how we currently use version)
[alternate-version] on Movies.SE

That said, I recommend renaming it to [edition-comparison]
One criteria for a meta-tag in the aforementioned link is that "If the tag commonly means different things to different people, it's probably a meta-tag". I do think that "version" is a bit too vague, especially compared to the two sites above. I think that migrating the tag to edition-comparison as RPG.SE does, would solve this ambiguity.


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What do we do about questions that had their game tag purged and now it's not clear what game they are about?
I recently came across Should you ever deploy your blank at a position other than an edge in Epigo?, which seems like a decent question. However, it lacks a game tag. As best I can tell, it had one at one point, which was automatically purged from the site (see Are tags mysteriously disappearing?).
I'd like to be helpful and add the tag back in, then add a tag wiki so that it doesn't get purged again. But the thing is, I have no clue what game it is. Other questions lacking a game tag usually have the name of the game in the title or the body of the question, but not this one.
While I hope that someone can identify this game, I'd also like to ask: what do you do in general if you come across an old question that no longer has any information about the game?
Also, do we do anything different with closed questions? I've come across Big or small team members in Heroclix?, which also lacks a game tag or any identifying information, but is closed and unlikely to be reoponed. Do we just leave these questions or do something else?
I suppose I could create an identify-this-game question about these games, but that seems a bit overkill.

Ideally, we find some way to figure out what the missing information is and edit it - into the question, not just the tag. Pretty much the same thing we'd do to any post we discover to be missing information!
Note that the untagged tag description basically says this:

This tag appears every now and then, when tags are deleted off of a question by automatic means. It means what it says, and indicates that those questions need editing.

Ways to do that:

look for a copy on archive.org
google bits of the question (and answers)
ask the OP (if they're still around)
ask here, or in chat, or even an identify-this-game if you really care
go hunt in SEDE (I'm not sure if deleted tags are preserved there?)

For Should you ever deploy your blank at a position other than an edge in Epigo?, based on "blank Epigon" in the question, I quickly found Epigo, which has pictures that look like the ones in the question.
For closed questions... eh. There's not any need to actively seek them out, but if the question hasn't been automatically deleted (which happens eventually without upvoted answers), and if it might get reopened, we can fix them if we notice them.
For Big or small team members, given that it was closed so long after it was posted, I suspect it was closed purely because the game name was missing from it, so no one could tell what it was about. That's definitely not good! But it has an accepted answer from someone who clearly understood what it was asking, so I went ahead and reopened.
And that one is Heroclix, which I found by googling "superman board game hulk damage points figures".


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Are pricing and value questions on topic?
The question What's the most valuable Avalon Hill wargame? was recently asked. Similar questions that might one day be asked are:

What is the most valuable Magic card?
Has the price of [board game] increased or decreased since it's gone out of print?

My concern is that these answers could become out of date (board game A was the most valuable today, now it's board game B). Also, while questions about value could probably be definitively answered for things like Magic given that there are so many price guides, it's less clear for things like Avalon Hill wargames.
Are questions like this on-topic for this site?

There's already a pricing tag with four questions going.

Heh, I have "Magic" as an ignored tag for me, which is why I didn't run across any pricing questions when I searched. I forgot that there could still be some. Still, it'd be good to decide here on meta about if this should remain on topic.

I would lean towards it being offtopic as the answers can change drastically depending on what happens in the gaming world. Your magic question for example could have a different answer if some of the highly valued cards where brought back into print (yes I know that isn't likely). As for a board games price that also would depend on how popular the game was and if it suddenly gains in popularity.

We actually have an answer for the most valuable magic card, it's black lotus or the 1996 World Champion card.

Pricing questions should be on topic regardless, and the community should use their votes to push low quality answers to the bottom.
I am not a fan of making rules where crowd moderation can work just fine. And this is absolutely one of those situations where crowd moderation can work just fine.
There are two kinds of answers that a pricing question can get.

Specific answers

Bad. Specific answers provide a price but no methodology. They do not give the reader the tools required to answer similar questions in the future.

General answers

Good. General answers describe a process by which readers can determine a price. They may provide a few examples (i.e., they can contain specific answers).

If a specific question gets a specific answer and the community upvotes the answer, guess whose fault that is?
Upvote good answers instead of making more rules.
Example: I ask about the current price of Tarmogoyf. Someone looks up the price and writes an answer that says it's worth $257.41. Without any additional information about the process he used to arrive at that price, I expect the community to downvote that answer.

Been thinking about this question for a few days, finally arrived at my answer and then discovered you'd already written it.  Wouldn't change a thing.  Thanks!

I think the key here is that the process needs to be documented. If that's included, it's easy to verify if the answer is still accurate years later.

General pricing questions should be on topic
One question we have is How do I find out a fair price for my Magic the Gathering cards?. This question is a general strategy of how to determine the value of card games. Where can I find the value of cards from the Dragon Ball Z Trading Card Game? is similar in this regard.
The key to these is that both questions also have longevity: the answers will likely be valid for years to come.
Questions about a specific price (or "most valuable", etc.) should not be on topic
Other questions are about the specific price of a game:

1993 collectors edition sealed box (closed as primarily opinion based)
What the value of a misprinted Graverobber Spider?
What's the most valuable Avalon Hill wargame?

Any answers to such questions will be relying on price guides or eBay results, and those prices can change drastically over a short period of time.. The price of a card or board game today may not be the same tomorrow.
Say that we had a question asking about the value of the Magic: The Gathering card Tarmogyf. Yesterday, I might have looked up a Magic the Gathering price guide and written an answer saying that the card was worth $257.41. But today, the guide says that it is worth $114.00. My answer is out of date and useless.
The same can happen for board games. Say that game X is the most valuable Avalon Hill board game today. Tomorrow, the game is reprinted and so its value is considerably less. Or perhaps game Y was an obscure game with a limited print run, but the designer hits it big with another game and people are much more interested in his or her earlier game. Now game Y is the most valuable game.
There's also the fact that prices are subjective. If price guide A says that something is worth $100, price guide B says it's worth $200, and there is currently an eBay listing for $300, which one is correct? There is no objective answer and it's up to individual opinion which one is correct.
There used to be a close reason of "Too Localized", which would be an ideal close reason for specific pricing questions. Since we don't have that here, I think that closing as primarily opinion-based would be an appropriate close reason for such specific questions.

'Too Localized' used to be a global close reason, but has been removed from all sites


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Converting HTTP images to HTTPS (and finding backups of the dead link ones)
Meta Stack Exchange has announced their roadmap to serving and uploading HTTPS images. Any images already uploaded to Stack Exchange's Imgur site will be automatically converted. Those that are linked to external sites will be made link-only.

After [https] is enabled, old posts that have HTTP images, accessible via HTTPS, will be edited accordingly. This will be an actual markdown change, attributed to the Community user, posts won't be bumped.

We'd like to prevent this from happening. Let's take the time to update our questions to point to HTTPS versions of our questions. Other sites, such as SciFi/Fantasy Stack Exchange, are undergoing similar efforts. This will unfortunately bump a lot of questions to the front page, but I think that this effort is best in the long run.
This Stack Exchange Data Explorer query should find all of them. At the time of this writing, there are 26 questions needing attention, so it's not a huge effort.
It looks to me like the majority of external HTTP images are for Magic cards. Unfortunately, none of the sites, (including Wizards' own Gatherer) support HTTPS at this time. Fortunately, we can upload them via the Stack Exchange image uploader, which will automatically future-proof them, as well as make sure they will still exist if the external site goes down.
Speaking of which, it does look like we have a few cases of the external site going down with these images. For instance, I found Hex board game strategy had an externally hosted image to a website that no longer existed. Fortunately, I was able to find it on Archive.org from a few years ago and was able to upload it to Stack Exchange's Imgur.
So to recap:

Find images that are externally hosted via HTTP
Either find HTTPS equivalents or upload them via the Stack Exchange image uploader (I think that uploading to SE would be preferable, in case the external link goes down)
If the external link is dead, try to find an old copy on Archive.org or elsewhere

FYI, I've been working on this by using the SEDE query, then sorting by number of views and working from top to bottom. Thus the ones more popular are more likely to have already been corrected. There are a few scattered ones I corrected before realizing I could sort.

For Magic card images, I'd favor just linking to the card, the way most questions do, and quoting the rules text or the relevant part of it if necessary. Generally it's not that important that the actual image be there.

@Jefromi I don't play Magic and so am less familiar with how the Magic questions on this site usually work, but I'd be fine with that. Feel free to edit out the pictures from any of them, including the ones I'd already switched to HTTPS (they should be on the front page).

Okay, sure. Do you want to also just copy the query results into an answer here so you/we can mark what we've fixed?

SEDE is off of data dumps, I think weekly, so yeah, it's unfortunately not usable for iteration like this.

I can work something out, one minute...

Done. All external HTTP images have been reuploaded or removed.
Here's everything that SEDE query returns. We can move things into the top section as we take care of them.
Completed:

Are there standard board sizes for the industry?
Is there ANY way to activate a planeswalker ability at instant speed? (Could maybe remove the Magic card image altogether)
How to defeat an active Digglet Pokemon when oppenent has an additional on bench   (Question)
How to defeat an active Digglet Pokemon when oppenent has an additional on bench  (Answer)
Reducing the Imperial strategy's power in Twilight Imperium
Are creature effects considered an Instant? (Replaced image of tap icon with userscript syntax)
Custom boards for Eclipse
Hex game strategy  (Found image on Archive.org, since site is dead)
Can I still crown a king if I run out of pieces?
What is the special die with pictograms in Monopoly used for?
Is a Pokémon energy card with no numbers normal?
Are there games with board presentation similar to Talisman and Relic?
Can I cast Enchant Creature cards on Enchantment Creatures (Bestow) that are on another creature? (Magic cards could maybe removed altogether?)
What's the difference between a Euchre, a March and a Set?  (via screenshots - the images were magical links directly into Google Books!)
Can a Dimir Keyrune receive a Cipher, and does the encoded spell stay?
Exploring locations in Pathfinder
Can I tap fewer than 7 creatures with Lullmage Mentor?
What is the memory-style game that has pawn-like tokens covering pictures?
Is the 4-player variant unbalanced? Is there a fix?
Did Wizards ever write a followup for the 2003 card face redesign? (We want to keep the Magic cards in this one, since it's about the visual design)
MTG: What set is Seelenruhe (Tranquility in German) from?  (image gone)
Mishra's Factory - Rarity and Peasant/Pauper Legality
Does a God's own mana cost count towards its own devotion?
Where are the building entrances in Zombies?
Soviet space exploration board game (now with pictures)
Looking for a really dizzying boardgame

Is it worth dividing the "Completed" into ones where we've reuploaded the image and ones where we removed the image entirely?

I wouldn't worry too much, unless you think you want someone else to look at it. The goal here is just to fix things.

I guess that's all of them? We're done with this?

Looks like it! Thanks for getting us started and doing so many of them.

And thank you for all of your help with creating the list and completing so many others!


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Are game category tags (party-game, team-game, etc) worth keeping?
We have a number of tags that are for categories of games, such as "trick-taking-games". In looking at them, it looks like they mostly exist for the following reasons:

19: As a supplementary tag to a question about a specific game and already tagged with that game's tag (e.g. bridge)
8: Closed recommendation question
2: Identify this game
2: Closed as too broad
2: Tagged solely with these tags (potentially had their game tag purged)
8: Other (seem to be able to be tagged with other things)

The first reason in particular makes it seem like a meta tag. For instance, Determining if/when to use trump in the "pre-game" of 2-handed Pinochle is tagged with trick-taking-games and pinochle, but I don't think that anything would be lost if the first tag were removed.
Here's a specific breakdown by tag.

trick-taking-games x 14

8: Also tagged with a specific board/card game (three of them have spades)
1: Comparison of a specific game to other trick-taking-games
1: General rule for error in play (could be etiquette?)
1: Counting cards
1: Request for tools to solve puzzles (possibly a game-recommendation)
1: Closed recommendation question
1: Closed as too broad

wargaming x 14

8: Also tagged with a specific board/card game (5 of them have warhammer-40k)
2: Game questions without a game tag (mostly one-offs that were likely purged)
1: Pricing for Avalon Hill Wargmaes
1: Modeling terrain
1: Closed recommendation question

family-games x 8

6: Closed recommendation questions
1: Identify this game
1: Also tagged with a specific board/card game

casino-games x 3

1: Playing games at a casino with a visual impairment
1: Identify this game
1: Also tagged with a specific board/card game (in this case, poker about video poker)

team-game x 2

2: Also tagged with a specific board/card game

living-card-games x 1

1: Closed as too broad

I'm definitely seeing a pattern here: these game category tags either are supplementary information that is not strictly necessary, or they are for recommendation questions (which are no longer on topic). The rest seem like they could be retagged without hurting the question.
Given that the vast majority of these tags are not needed on the questions they are tagged with, is there any reason that we should keep these category tags?

My vote is to Delete them all.
I've always favored using game tags are our main form of tagging and don't have much use for tags which encompass more than one game.
Exceptions are certain tags which aren't directly about particular games, ex: game-design history
Also some games that use a very close similar rule set can be usefully grouped when it is likely that an expert on one would be able to assist across those games, ex: pathfinder-adventure, 18xx

I think removing the game type tags from the questions is a good move, though it has been nice for games that do not yet have their own tag, and perhaps are looking for consensus based on similar games within the same type. This is particularly potent for low rep users who need to tag their question, but cannot tag a game that does not yet have it's own unique tag.

@daviscodesbugs - we should optimize for experts.  Newbies are awesome, but they will nearly always need help (editing, categorizing, how to answer...etc)  Tagging a new game is rare enough that I don't think it warrants worrying about it much.

@daviscodesbugs It doesn't seem like [identify-this-game] was benefiting from category tags anyway, so I don't think anything was lost there. As for newbies, it's definitely unfortunate when they want to tag with a game not in the system, but since these tags don't make sense long-term, I don't think this is the right solution to that.

I agree with the above statements (as mentioned in my original comment) just thought I'd mention the downsides to see if there were a more elegant way to address both issues.

This retagging is complete. Thanks for suggesting this!


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How should a tag and tag wiki for "En Garde!" be written since there are 5 games with the same name, and the question is not about the most popular?
We have a question In the game "En Garde!" - How do optional routines work?, which has had its tag en-garde removed before because no tag wiki was created. I decided that I was willing to add a tag wiki so that doesnt happen again.
However, there are five games with that name. Sometimes when I've come across games with the same name, the task has been easy because one version has been far and beyond more popular. For instance, I recently wrote the tag wiki for trajan. There are two games with that name, but the question was about the one that is newer, and is currently ranked 49 on Board Game Geek where the next one is ranked 4087.
But in this case, the question is about the version of En Garde! that is neither the most popular, nor the newest. It's conceivable that someone may want to ask a question about one of the more popular or newer games with that name.
So how should the tag and tag wiki be written?

On Arqade, we have occasionally solved this problem by adding the publication year to the tag to uniquely identify the specific game. The new Doom game, for example, is tagged [doom-2016] to distinguish it from the original Doom game. The same approach should work here, at least in this case, where we already know that all of the games with that name were published in different years.
So, that question would be tagged with en-garde-1975, and then the tag wiki can be written as normal, treating the tag name as a specific reference to one game.

I've gone ahead and changed the tag on that question. Thanks for the suggestion!


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Can't find the game "Wild Cards", so can't fill out the tag wiki
We've had a number of calls for adding tag wikis (e.g. Tags (and wikis) needed!), since tags without wikis are destroyed after 6 months if they are only linked to one question. Recently, I came across Looking for rules to a card game called "Wild Cards" and changed it from untagged to the newly created wild-cards. Naturally, I wanted to add a wiki to prevent the tag from being deleted in 6 months.
However, I found that I am unable to find anything about this game. The question asker describes it as a game that is played in groups of four across several tables. However, the only ones listed on Board Game Geek are:

A 2005 game for 2-6 players that does not appear to have been released in English
A 2013 game that is more a collection of rules for 52 card decks, and was published after this question was asked
A series of decks for 2-6 players that are just ways to play Memory, Old Maid, and Go Fish.

Without being able to find out anything about this game (assuming that the name is correct), I have no way to write a tag wiki for it, and the tag will be deleted in 6 months.
What should I do in this situation?

I'm actually voting to close the question you're referring to as unclear. I'm not even sure they're describing a board or card game so much as some kind of rotating format someone came up with styled after speed dating. Whatever it is, we have just about no passable detail about it to identify it.

That question is essentially asking for us to identify a game, where all we have to go on is the name they think they remember and some of the rules. So, it should be tagged with identify-this-game.
Unless we know that a game exists, we should not make a tag for it.

I agree with this strongly enough I've made that change. It is an identify-this-game question. But we're also not sure whether the game they're looking for is one called wild cards, that could've just been the name someone used after they forgot the original name - which would explain their difficulty finding the rules. Like you point out, we're not even sure it exists. Naturally we can't really have a tag for this, if we don't know what on earth the thing is that we're tagging. (Granted, if the meta finds differently, the change can yet be un-made fairly easily.)


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What is our stance on questions about board & card game-related events?
What is our policy on questions about board & card game-related events that do not directly involve how to play the games? For instance, could someone ask about how a Magic tournament is run, or a convention? I could imagine several sorts of questions in this vein:

How do I find out about official Magic tournaments in my area?
How do I make sure that people don't walk off with games in an "opening gaming" room at a convention?
How can I find board gamers in the city I just moved to?
What do I need to do to qualify for the North American Bridge Championships?
Does GenCon have designated areas for playing board games?

This question was inspired by  When is International TableTop Day?, which currently has a vote to close "because it is about the schedule of an event, not about board or card games". While I realize it's not an ideal question because it is time-sensitive, I would like to know more about the general policy we have about gaming-related events.
Note that we do have tournament, but I don't think we have anything about non-tournament events, aside from the newly created events.

Old answer says thumbs up - http://meta.boardgames.stackexchange.com/questions/61/are-questions-about-boardgames-related-events-on-topic

While I disagree with the reason to close on your question, I don't think it is a particularly good question. For one if you search for "International Tabletop Day" 4 of the top 5 results (at least for me) had the date, most of them in great big letters. Also unlike the rest of your example questions your actual question's answer becomes outdated without constant updates to the answer

A better way to advertise for Tabletop Day might've been to ask what it is. The schedule could still be mentioned as part of an answer, but I suspect that giving an overview of the event and why it's awesome would be more helpful anyways!

@Jefromi Actually, the intention wasn't to advertise, but merely to answer a legitimate question. It's been done in my area several times and people in my group have asked when it is.

@Thunderforge Ah. I figured it was more about spreading the news since as diego pointed out it's pretty trivial to find out when it is, easier than posting a question. (And anyone else looking would presumably use Google and find the answer and never see the question either.)

Yes these sorts of questions are on-topic. While they are not about board game rules, they are still questions that have to do with board games and are best answered by board game experts.

For what it's worth I vote we keep them. I don't think a question about a meetup is necessarily off topic. I do think it will open the door to many different types of off topic questions like "Where's the best board game store in [Location]" or "How much should I sell [Game] for?" but questions like "When is Tabletop Day?" i think are fine because it has a definitive answer because of the implied time restriction.


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Should I delete my own wrong answer?
On this question, I answered first thinking I had the ruling right. After the addition of the correct answer by another user, it's obvious I had it wrong. I'm wondering if the incorrect answer should even remain in the thread. This could apply widely to all answers that are wrong.
Deleting the wrong answer would clean up the thread and present the right answer as the only one. But the correct answer has now been accepted, so it's floated to the top anyway. If we're looking to increase our metrics, then leaving incorrect answers makes sense. But from a clarity standpoint, maybe it makes sense to delete them.
Is the etiquette here to self-delete the wrong answer, or should it be left up? How do others feel about this?

First of all: the general guideline is ignore site metrics when choosing your course of action. Just because the metric expects 2.5 answers per question does not mean we should add unnecessary extra answers to questions! These are just aggregate broad-brush metrics, and they are inherently limited.
As you point out, there are a couple of ways to view wrong answers. A wrong answer that looks right can be actively harmful if a reader took away the impression that it was correct. On the other hand, a wrong answer that is subtle or easy to arrive at has value in being present, since it marks the common error. There are also gradations; sometimes an answer is mostly right, or only right under common circumstances, etc.
From a site mechanic perspective, the intention seems to be to encourage deletion. If you leave a wrong answer up it will tend to be downvoted, accrue challenging comments, and so on, which you may not enjoy. There are also two badges (Disciplined and Peer Pressure) which explicitly reward you for deleting answers when you believe they aren't helpful.
However, in this case I think the answer is very subtle. It was clear that most people thought you were correct, until the other answer showed up with the official ruling. In this situation, I think you would do best to edit your answer to indicate that you are aware it is incorrect, but that it is nevertheless a common misconception (you can point out exactly why as well, if you like). That should protect you from further downvotes while preserving a useful piece of information for the future.
Ultimately though, it's up to you. As usual, this has been discussed before. Check out these links for some other views.

Should I remove a wrong answer (Peer Pressure)?
When or should you delete your incorrect answer?

Excellent response! The first paragraph alone is reason enough to warrant lots of votes :)

First off, I would like to thank you for your commendable handling :)
I would disregard the metrics completely. In my opinion, the important thing is "to make the internet a better place". If the answer does not add anything valuable, just delete it.
If you feel the mistake you made in your answer could be made by others easily, you could change your answer to point out why that would have been a mistake. But I'm not sure if this is useful (it does not help that I have no clue about MtG).

This is how I felt about it, but I'm going to wait a little while to see any other input. Thanks for the compliment, too.

Short, sweet, direct -- mafu, how did we get on without you? :)

We learn more from our mistakes than our success, though learning from our successes is much easier.
If you believe that your wrong answer, possibly edited with additional explanation adds value to the question, leave it; if you feel it is merely a distraction that is likely to confuse, then delete it. As pointed out elsewhere, it is all about making te internet, and SE in particular, a better place.
While the decision is yours alone (assuming there is no reason for mods to step in), the opinions of others as expressed in up- and down-votes can be used to assist you in making a decision. Just remember that they may not always be informed votes.


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Why would someone edit out italicized words?
I recently asked the question "What Happens when I Radiate a Time Stretch with Time Sifter in play?" I had purposefully added Italics to the card names so that they were distinguishable in the text, making the paragraphs easier to read. My question was just edited and the editor removed all of the Italics in the OP. Why would this have been done?

I can't speak for the editor in question, but I would have done the same thing. While I do understand your reasoning about clarity, italics for game terminology is not a convention used by anyone else here for Magic questions, or indeed any other questions on the site. Given that you've already linked the card names to Gatherer, which highlights them nicely as hyperlinks, and the pre-existence of a style convention, the italics are not really necessary.
I reviewed the edit, and in my opinion, the original use of italics was jarring and odd.
Bear in mind that as the original author, you always have the right to revert changes you don't agree with. But if your intention is clarity for readers, then I suggest you keep the changes, since as far as I'm concerned, the question was improved by the edit.

If it's a convention of the site than cool. I'll leave it edited.

The main reason I edited your post was to correct the name of the card Timesifter. It's one word, not two. But as long as I was editing, I decided to remove the italics because, as ire_and_curses said, it's conventional among all MTG sites I've seen to write card names in the same font as the surrounding text. The only thing that distinguishes them as card names is the capitalization and optionally a link to Gatherer or a similar site. (And of course the grammatical context.)


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Should we allow questions that function as survey questions?
I was drawn back to the following question from activity in my feed:
How do we assign Game of Thrones houses?
As I looked at it again, I started to think of the question in a different light. It looks to me like a survey question, where the OP has posted a question and three different options, allowing the community to vote on which one they like more. (The catch here is that I stepped in the middle and posted an alternative.) Given the format, it would have also fit on SurveyMonkey.
For me, this seems like a misuse of the Q&A format provided by StackExchange sites. Should questions that function as survey questions be allowed on B&CG.SE? If not, what reason would be given for closing?

I think it is just a bad question as the solution appears to be spelled out in the rules.

@JoeW I think the point I'm trying to make is that this is a survey disguised as a question. The OP knows that there is a solution in the rules, but is laying out alternatives and letting people vote on them.

In this case it is really about house rules but it is overall just a bad question.

No, we shouldn't.
Such questions are not in the spirit of a "one question gets one answer" ideal that Stack Exchange aims for.
Then of course, these are almost always primarily opinion-based if there is no way to objectively determine the best answer, and too broad if they either invite thread-style discussion or cannot be comprehensively answered by less than a chapter in a book.

I don't agree that SE has a "one question, one answer" ideal. Many questions have multiple solutions which could be packed into different answers, and part of graduation has to do with the question to answer ratio being 2.5 or higher. I also think that this question could be based on expertise, which is fine by site standards as outlined in [help]. I don't think your answer is addressing the core issue I'm relaying, which is using SE as a survey tool.

Graduation requirements are about usage and user numbers. Having more answers to a question is proxy for activity of answerers. You can't have more answers without either more questions or more answers per question, so the latter is how answer activity gets rated. Then of course, the tour is very direct: "Don't ask about... // Questions that are primarily opinion-based // Questions with too many possible answers or that would require an extremely long answer" And an ideal is not meant to reflect reality, that's why it's an ideal and not a target or requirement.

I upvpoted only because of the primarily opinion based part of this answer. The other part, "one question gets one answer", could use some justification. A link to a Help page, parent Meta, an SO blog, or anything else authoritative would work.

I did a little research myself. It's possible to ask a good question that has multiple correct answers. I also found this blog post by Jeff Atwood that talks about polling questions. As Aarobot (the inspiration for that blog post) says, "real questions have answers, not items or ideas or opinions".

@Rainbolt Those are interesting reads and worth the time. However, I think they are using "poll" in a different way than the issue to which I am referring. In the referenced case, the same user has posted the question and three different answers. In the cases your links discuss, answers to the questions are by different users. The difference is in intent and design; the OP for my referenced post designed the question and answers, whereas the poll questions Aarobot delves into become poll questions because of community involvement.

@SocioMatt The first link had nothing to do with poll questions. My intent was to show that the Stack Exchange network does accept some questions that have multiple answers. The other link describes exactly the kind of poll question that you are asking about. It doesn't matter who writes the answers to a question like that. A self-answered poll question is still a poll question.

I don't think it's helpful to focus too much on "one question one answer" or "objectively determine the best answer." Even for objective questions, there may be multiple solutions with no clear best one, or with the best one varying depending on circumstances. That's totally fine, it doesn't break the system, and they can be very useful questions. And this only becomes more true with good subjective questions (which are okay!). What we want to avoid is many answers, especially with no hints at all about which might be better.

There are many instances where I believe this would be appropriate. There are many games that leave choices up to the user and without any specific way of executing the choice. Having questions which give multiple ways of coming to a decision would maybe yield multiple right answers, but the person asking the question may in fact want multiple answers. This is something that I believe should be changed in the rules even if it's not my decision.

A question having multiple and different correct answers on it does not mean it is a poll question. This is about questions where the goal is not to get a correct answer but to rate multiple methods of solving the problem.


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Should we have a trivia tag?
Inspired by this question:
Which games have ever been rated #1 on Boardgamegeek.com's Geek Rating?
The Sports.SE has a trivia tag with the following description:

For questions generally relating to small, specific facts regarding a player, team, or game that are not common knowledge. Questions should also be tagged with the sport referenced.

The above question seems to me to be trivia related, although not about a specific game. While the Sports.SE tag is generally paired with another tag, a trivia tag on B&CG.SE wouldn't have to be.

We should allow trivia questions, but not introduce a tag for it.
I borrowed justification from The Death of Meta Tags, by Jeff Atwood. The trivia tag is a meta tag. It describes a particular "kind" of question, but does not tell you what the question is actually about. It could not stand alone as the only tag on a question. In other words, every single question tagged trivia will require a supporting tag (like chess trivia, or Magic: the Gathering trivia).
The Sports community skipped a step when they were discussing trivia. After looking at their meta discussion from years ago, it looks like this happened:

"Should we allow Sports trivia?"
  "Yes, we should, but let's make some rules so that we only have good trivia."
The trivia tag is born.

But hold on a second! Nobody bothered to ask...

"Do we make a tag for it?"

It does not follow that just because a particular breed of question is on topic that we need a tag for it.
We do not we need to generate any sort of rules like Sports SE. Easily searchable trivia will be downvoted for lack of research effort. Subjective trivia will be closed as primarily opinion based.

Tangentially, what should the question I linked be tagged with?

@SocioMatt If the question were on topic, I would tag it [tag:board-game-geek]. See my comment on the question for why I believe it is off topic. I did my best to answer your question without dwelling too much on the example you used - it frustrates me when people do that to me.

I think your answer makes sense in the context of trivia as a tag. I just curious as to what would be as acceptable solution if there was no such tag.

@SocioMatt A solution to... what? I'm not sure that I understand the problem we are trying to solve. Do we need to properly tag questions that are off topic?

It depends on whether it actually gets closed as off-topic.

@SocioMatt You misread my question. Do we need to properly tag questions that are off topic? Without the bold part, yes, it would depend.

I have no idea whether that is necessary or not. On one hand, even closed questions should sort into the set of site-standards that have been created. On the other, if they are going to be deleted quickly after being closed, then it might not be worth the effort. That may be another meta question.

My question was intended to be rhetorical. We do not need tags for off topic questions. Go ahead and ask a meta question about it if you want, but I can already tell you that that is the answer you'll probably get.

@Rainbolt I agree strongly enough on tagging it with board-game-geek that I've added that tag.

No. We might need it later.
On a games site, the tag "trivia" seems better used for games like Trivial Pursuit where the gameplay involves the recall of specific facts. It's analogous to party.


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At what point are questions identical?
I was looking at the comments for Does transforming keyrunes count towards Evolve? and was curious about when questions actually become similar to warrant a close vote. corsiKa's comment and link point to the idea that the question and the possible duplicate (If a permanent turns into a(nother) creature, has it entered the battlefield?) are distinct questions.
This caused me to go back and take a look at some older duplicate closings. I noticed one that was closed but probably could have had a similar argument made to stay open. https://boardgames.stackexchange.com/questions/8020/globals-and-protection-from-that-color asks about both global destroy effects and global -/- counters, but was closed as an exact duplicate of of What does protection from [quality] do?, which asks only about global destroy. This would make them appear to be distinct questions even though the answers will be the same; "destroy" is not the same as adding -/- counters to creatures, but the result is the same when you're talking about color protections.
The questions about evolve are in the same situation. They could be distinct questions and have the same answer; lands are not artifacts, but the interaction with evolve is the same when you animate either.
So my question is: where is the line on whether a question is close enough to another to warrant closing? I feel like this is at least sort of common on B&GC since we deal with rules questions. Small changes in the object or game state may actually change the way rules are applied, and either of my examples could (although they don't) have different answers because the event is slightly different (destroy or -/- counters; land or artifact). It seems important to find this line to be consistent in closing questions as exact duplicates.

relevant blog link: http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2010/11/dr-strangedupe-or-how-i-learned-to-stop-worrying-and-love-duplication/

I believe that the key attribute for being a duplicate are when the keywords that might be picked up by a search engine are the same in both questions, and the answers are the same.
Clearly the second condition is necessary. However, it is useful to have some near-duplicates that reference each other, when it broadens the base of keywords that will attract future visitors needing the same answer. These question should link to each other, and in future may be worth merging, but it is not necessary to duplicate them zealously when they are phrased in dissimilar ways that assist more OP's to find a good answer here on Board & Card Games.

I think all questions about specific cards are not as useful as questions about general concepts. They should then be rewritten in generic terms, only using the specific cards in an example. All questions should be considered duplicates or at a minimum, should link to the generic answer first if the same answer would be sufficient to answer the question.
In the two examples that you gave:
Do global spells with [quality] affect creatures with protection from [quality]?
Can creatures with protection from [quality] be blocked by creatures with [quality]?
These are both different questions, but they both can be answered by the same answer, "How does protection from [quality] work?" You can see how they were both originally written, they were about specific cards, and I am sure how you can see if we allowed questions about specific cards to be considered unique what trouble that would cause. So, in general I think questions about game concepts are most useful, questions about generic cards are slightly worse, and specific card questions are worst. If we don't close them, we should at least link to the same answer first, and then comment on the specific cards.

How does protection from [quality] work?
Does protection from [quality] prevent [targeting¦blocking¦damage¦enchantment]?
Is[specific card] affected by [specific card]?

What happens to a creature with protection from green when I cast Hurricane, What happens to a creature with protection from red when I cast Earthquake, What happens when I cast Wildfire when my opponent has protection from red? [...]
What is important is understanding what "protection from [quality]" does." Once someone understands that, all questions regarding protection are duplicates.
The same goes for your other questions:

Does animating an artifact trigger Evolve?
Does animating a land trigger "Enters the Battlefield" triggers?

I personally think that both of these questions are duplicates of, "What does it mean for a creature to "Enter the Battlefield?" or "Does changing an object into a creature cause it to Enter the Battlefield?" or some similar variation.
I made this point ages ago when we were getting what I would consider duplicate questions like, how does lifelink and first strike intetact? How does lifelink and double strike interact? How does lifelink and double strike interact if a creature has trample? How does trample interact with protection? [...] Ad Nausium.
If we don't close these as duplicates, I will rue the day people start asking:

I attack with a 1/1 and my opponent blocks with a 1/1, what happens?

I attack with a 2/1 and my opponent blocks with a 1/1, what happens?
I attack with a 1/1 and my opponent blocks with a 2/1, what happens?
I attack with a 2/1 and my opponent blocks with a 2/1, what happens?
I attack with a 1/2 and my opponent blocks with a 1/1, what happens?
I attack with a 1/1 and my opponent blocks with a 1/2, what happens?
I attack with a 1/2 and my opponent blocks with a 1/2, what happens?
I attack with a 2/2 and my opponent blocks with a 2/2, what happens?

[...]

Not that I necessarily disagree with the general theme, but it seems too broad to close all cards about specific questions. For example, how would you deal with http://boardgames.stackexchange.com/questions/11794/how-does-valakut-trigger-with-a-card-like-harrow-or-scapeshift-putting-multiple? Since the question is specifically about Valakut, would it be practical to turn it into a question about lands entering the battlefield to trigger abilities?

So I meant to say "questions about specific cards." Yay for proofreading.

@SocioMatt, Valakut is about "intervening if clauses" and EtB triggers. I have modified my answer, because I do believe that closing questions about specific cards is overkill. Some cards are complicated enough that they deserve specific answers [mtg:Chaos Moon] (what happens when you Lightning Bolt a creature to make the count odd/even then during the main phase a red creature/mountain EtB (-1/-1 or not ... RR/colorless?)