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One of the rules of the Hare dictates that when he is in or tied for 1st, he doesn't move (naps) when 4 Hare cards are played in the card pool. Once other racers have secured a place on the podium, if the Hare is in the lead among remaining players, should he adhere to napping when 4 cards are played?

From a strict reading of the rules, we can probably agree that he doesn't nap once he's lost the chance to be first place.

From a game balance perspective, I feel like 18 Hare cards (versus the others' 17, 16, 15 and 15) doesn't quite put the occurrence of 4 Hares frequently enough to cut the edge he has moving two spaces each turn. Sure, Hare moves 2 regardless of how many of 1-4 cards, while Fox moves X cards outright, so you could roughly argue Fox averages 2.5 per card and Hare 2.0 per card, but Hare has 18 v Fox's 15 so moves much more frequently at lower cost. If just 4 of Fox's cards are wasted on wolf howls his game is over. From a game balance perspective, I would be ok with making Hare nap anytime he is 1st place among remaining racers. I don't think the likelihood of hitting the 4-card-and-in-first penalty is high and should be an ever-present threat to Hare.

From a story continuity perspective, the same drive that motivates him to nap when he's in the lead probably doesn't hold once he sees he's already lost the race, so this would argue for no napping once another character finishes.

I am interested in opinions and also further analysis on the game balance of the Hare's rules given his card count (18 in the deck). My analysis has just been loose and based on feel.

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While you are right that the hare moves more frequently than the other animals, its up to the players not betting on the hare to win to make sure to not let someone just play 1 card per turn, (as this would be the most effective way to win with the hare). If you are playing with new people you will see that this is a clear tale on when someone is betting on the hare. Usually when this happen all the players not betting on the hare(assuming there is no other player betting on it) can easily horde hare cards and only play them when there will 4 on the board, or when a howl is played.

If no one has willingly picked the hare the game has a total of 76 cards(since each player bets 5 cards out of the deck), and out of those 18 are hare. Now each player holds 6 cards so the chances that a player has a hare card is 23% this is almost guarantees that the non betting players will have a combined total of 4 hare cards. Since they aren't betting on the hare to win then if played correctly they should be able to throw away 4 cards at least in one turn. Combined with the howling wolfs cards this means that you can at least throw away 7 cards at minimum.

If you assume all players are betting on the hare (including the guy who is dealt the hare) the card total goes from 18 to 13. The more ppl bet on the same animal the less chance that animal has to win statistically, but since more ppl are going for it, it will most likely move more often. (If everyone is going for the hare no one will play more than one hare per turn as there is no benefit).

Overall the game is very well balanced i have played this game probably over 200 times now, (this is a great game to play with anyone, and my friends and family love playing this game for how simple it is to pick up but how hard it is to master) and the outcome of the game now comes down to being able to read what each person is betting on.

Opps forgot to copy and paste the paragraph on answering the question, I interpret the rules as only when the hare is First place (or tie since technically they are tie for first place), so how can the hare be in first place if someone already won the race, and you are racing for second, and third? This is my interpretation and I have found out that this does not make the hare place second automatically. I would not make the hare sleep as I feel that it would significantly lower its chances of even placing at all.

As I pointed out earlier its fairly easy at the beginning to tell what people are betting on if they do the optimal play every turn so this game starts turning more into a meta game of how people play rather than people doing the optimal play because when you end up losing 4 cards of your animal it becomes basically impossible to win.

I would most more statistics on the game but I'm at work currently and this response has gone on longer than it should already(I will try to update it with more numbers on how things play out assuming you have 5 players because with less players the game starts to become more about getting lucky to draw the right cards at the right time).

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  • My impression with 4-5 players is that the card pool grows so fast, it leaves an urgency that you won't get another chance to contribute (especially with 4-5 players). It often seems that people will more likely play a card that helps their racers in favor of hindering another one (like forcing the Hare to nap). Granted, this depends how close the Hare is to winning, too. I'm not entirely convinced it's easy for the players opposed to the Hare to work together to induce the nap. Maybe easier with 2-3 players?
    – Joey
    May 15, 2015 at 15:34
  • Hindering another player is not only done by not playing their cards, but also not allowing them to play cards so that they can cycle through their hand quickly. Remember that you cant play more than 8 cards in the table, as well as you can trigger a race to allow you to cycle cards by forcing a race when there is 4 of a kind for one animal (allowing you to cycle your hand quicker but not others). Also keep in mind that the hare is tied for second slowest animal when played perfectly it requires 6 rounds of movement in order to win. If you want we can have a private chat about the game.
    – ZeRaTuL_jF
    May 15, 2015 at 15:57
  • I like the point of the Hare being capped at 2 spaces of movement being a limiting factor while 3 of the others have the potential to move 3-5 spaces. He's almost like the tortoise in that sense that he can (but also must) plod along steadily, just at a faster rate, with a requirement of at least a card, and a halting potential when leading.
    – Joey
    May 15, 2015 at 19:04
  • Yea he is a slower turtle, I find it that the hardest person to counter to the Sheep due to the fact that the way he is balanced is by luck since where the water tiles are placed is based on the shuffling. I have found out that the only way to stop the sheep from winning when given good draw of water tiles is the howling wolf.
    – ZeRaTuL_jF
    May 15, 2015 at 19:11

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