How can you get around the lack of early stone in two-player Agricola?

Question

In two-player Agricola, the first Take Stone action space appears in Rounds 5-7. Apart from one or two Minor Improvements, there is no way to get stone earlier than this. Having played quite a few such games, I feel that this is an unfortunate limitation, as certain cards such as the Axe and the Peat Charcoal Kiln (in Farmers of the Moor) are very useful if played early. But as they cost stone, you might have to wait until round 7 to have a chance, and this almost completely negates their usefulness.

Games with 3-5 players have ways of picking up small amounts of stone before the Take Stone cards appear. I feel like an equivalent would make the two-player game more flexible. Would it break the game to modify the rules slightly (e.g. including the "Take one building resource" 3-player action card, or something else along those lines), or should I just accept the limitations? In most respects the game seems very well balanced but I feel like this is an exception.

Answer 1

As far as breaking the game goes you'd have to experiment. Since those cards don't always come up it's hard to say with out play testing how early stone would affect a 2-player game with and without those cards.

My suggestion would be to as you say accept the limitation and use the draw 10 pick 7 method for Minor Improvements and Occupations. That way if you are playing a 2-player game and draw a great card but it requires stone you can decide not to keep it.

Ultimately house ruling things is about having more fun, so if you add a path to early stone for 2-player games and it's more enjoyable for everyone then go for it. That said, in my opinion, Agricola shines at making you feel like you never have enough time to do stuff so removing that from the game (even in a small way) diminishes one of the core qualities of the game.