Carcassonne Central

I've been thinking about the meteor tile some more lately.  I think the best mechanic for it is to replace a tile aready in play with it.  I guess it should function somewhat like an abbey in that it still completes whatever touches it on the sides assuming it only removes one tile.  Perhaps it should remove more than one.  Thoughts...?

Desiring this to be a two-tile expansion, I'm not sure what to make the other tile.  I thought briefly about just adding it with the forest fire tile, but quickly decided that it would be useless to people who don't play with the forest even though it's quite good. 

I thought about an earthquake tile, the idea being that when you place it, you split all the tiles in the playing area in one direction and seperate them by one tile width and place the earthquake tile in the gap.  I probably wouldn't mind doing this, but it could be quite tedious for some people. 

Perhaps a tornado tile to remove meeples within a certain radius?  That might be too game changing.

Originally, I thought the meteor would go pretty well with the plague, but that's already being used. 

Check out the hurricane in "turbulent waters."  You might be able to use those tiles.

Hmm... I'd like to, but for some reason I can't unzip it.

You can now download the file from Public Downloads.

If you have a Solar Eclipse tile, you can rename it "Signs and Portents".  I have no idea what a Solar Eclipse tile would do.  A Lunar Eclipse tile would be interesting too :)

Well, that's an interesting idea, but I have no idea what they would do either.  Flood might be cool, but it seems like there would be too many possibilities and restrictions to placement for just one tile. 

I've actually been thinking for some time about possibly doing a Natural Disasters expansion...I think my forest fire gave me that idea.  Anyways, one of my ideas was to include Locusts...something that would severely hurt a farm. So, that's just another thought...

That idea would fit nicely for an Ark of the Covenant expansion ;)

 Yes it would.  I was thinking about the Ten Plagues.

The drought tile from Drought and Pestilence hurts a farm.  It's kind of an anti-pig farm.  However, I doubt it does as much damage as you're suggesting.  Whatever we can come up with, we could probably include the Drought and Pestilence tiles (assuming permission). 

Sorry for the double post.  I'm ready to get started on this one.  I'm thinking a 6-12 tiles in the set.  Probably less is more.  Ideally, I think we should add a few of the Drought and Pestilance tiles.  The Forest Fire seems like an obvious inclusion as well.  This probably sounds a little more like a compilation, but I wonder if we couldn't try the Earthquake and Flood tiles.  Any ideas on how these could work?

Well, flood tile should be used with river or river II or any of the fishermen series. I suggest that the flood tile should replace a river tile and any feature in a tile touching orthogonally the flood tile would score one point less or no point at all. Basically it will flood all adjacent tiles and make them worthless. If already scored, then nothing would happen. Regarding the farm, the tile adjacent to the flood tile wont be used to check city supply.

Other disaster, althoug not natural could be pillaged farms. With this tiles if placed on a farm with a farmer, at the end of the turn the farmer would return to his owner supply. In case more than one farmer, the player who placed the tile chooses wich one goes. Removing a farmer is counted as moving the wood (it would be like a princess but affecting farmers)

Earthquake, I would say make it a full city tile that can replace a full city tile or be placed normally. This tile wont be counted for scoring purposes, can also replace a cathedral tile.

will keep thinking in more dissasters :)

I'd like to see the tornado as a piece of wood instead of a tile.  Not sure how to design that, but it would act similar to the dragon, but instead of removing meeple, it would carry one.  Then when it moved to a tile with another meeple on it, then that meeple is exchanged with the one in the tornado.  If the exchange makes no sense(like putting a pig on the road in place of a thief), then that meeple is returned to their owners supply.  I'm not sure if keeping the movement the same as the dragon would out as well though.

Tornado sounds cool. But not sure how it work work as a wooden piece- I agree it would be kinda hard. Would there be a substitute for a wooden piece? Maybe an icon on several tiles? or maybe it could just be a wooden disk?

The tornado idea seems funny, also a must if playing with the wizards of Oz  ;D

Meeples in cities should be safe from tornados, city walls serve for more than keep enemies at bay.

In case of tornado moving as a dragon, can it carry more than one follower?

Maybe can be used like a gallow but for farmers. Will keep them frozen until a new tornado tile is drawn.

Thanks for weighing in on this one everyone!

I like the tornado as a meeple idea.  I think it's unique and could be fun.  I think a disk would be easiest.  Maybe it could be painted with a swirly pattern or have a sticker put on it. 

Here were my original ideas for the flood and earthquake... for the flood I was thinking of a mechanic something like a JPutt idea.  The flood tile is replaces an existing river tile and stays there for one turn.  After completing one round, when it is the same player's turn again, that tile is removed as well as the 8 surrounding it and they are replaced with a large 3x3 tile of a flooded area.  Any meeples on those tiles are removed and the tiles are removed from play.  I suppose there could also be an intermediate stage with a 2x2 also if desired.

For the earthquake, I think the idea I like the best would be choosing a seam to place the tile and then splitting the board in half along whatever seam is chosen and seperating all the tiles in both directions by one tile width and placing the earthquake tile in the gap.  I know that could be extremely difficult depending on how far along in the game you are, but I can't think of a mechanic I like better.

Hum, I´m not a geologist, but earthquakes area of damage are normally rounded. If you want to make it in a seam, that would be caused by a tectonic plaque (like San Andres in Cal. we dont have many of those in Europe, so the effect of the earthquake shall be rounded)

The earthquakes affect mostly buildings. What I have think as my previous idea wasnt very good. It´s making one earthquake tile that can be placed anywhere, all buildings (cities, cloister, inns, shrines, etc) in the adjacent tiles would be destroyed so no further scoring for them and all followers in these building returned to their owners supplies. This way farms wont be affected, neither roads (that time roads were trails). If you want more destruction the range can be made bigger.

With this option there are several options, use some meeple to show destroyed buildings or make tiles (hard work but more aesthetic, for this purpose JPutt927 work with the city of carcassonne in barbarian hoard is amazing  {up )

I don't know if this expansion is still/currently being worked on but one great natural disaster thats already incorporated into the game would be volcanic eruption.  Maybe a special "Pompeii" (sp?) volcano tile that without playing P&D would cause some significant level of damage around it but if your are playing with P&D the rules change such that it alone does less damage but it causes all volcanoes in play to erupt and do damage wherever they are.

I think the flood idea with replacing the 3x3 tile is cool but it would end up graphically mismatching.  Perhaps it could be given a border similar to an abbey showing it fits anywhere but (1) all features connecting to it score less then usual but are considered complete on that side, (2) all features remain incomplete so all meeples are "trapped" due to flooding, (3) same condition as 1 but allow and escape like the siege can be escaped through neighboring cloisters.


I also really like the Tornado piece idea.  Maybe there could be tiles that introduce prevailing winds and it moves that direction.  I could be built onto tiles like in Oceans or maybe be drawn similar to the mechanic in Barbarian Hordes.

Well, it's not closed as such, but it is up for vote for the collaboration of the month. 

So this is one of two we have so far for December.  Let's see what we can do with it.  Here are the ideas that have been suggested so far.  Please forgive me if I've left one out. 

• 6-12 tiles
• Possibly including the Drought and Pestilance expansion
• Possibly including the Forest Fire tile
• A Meteor tile
• Some sort of Eclipse tile
• A Flood tile (or tiles, or large tile)
• An Earthquake tile
• A Swarm of Locusts tile
• A Tornado tile (or meeple)
• A Hurricane tile (similar to The Ocean - Turbulent Waters)

So let's talk about it.

I don't know if it’s one for consideration or not but I think taking advantage of the already existent volcanoes for a volcanic eruption disaster could be cool. A tile that marks an eruption and all volcanoes do some form of damage to either the surrounding features or meeples. Or that could be a variation if using P&D and there could be stand alone eruption tile.

Earlier in the thread was mention of the ten plagues.  Wikipedia lists them concisely as follows with me filling in possible adaptations of the ideas CKormann listed that could be re themed to fit:

(Exodus 7:14–25) water turned to blood killing all fish and other water life.   [possibly adapt the flood idea to this theme]
(Exodus 8:1–8:15) amphibians (commonly believed to be frogs) [maybe an adaptation of Jabberwocky’s Oxbow idea]
(Exodus 8:16–19) lice or gnats [something affecting meeples maybe]
(Exodus 8:20–30) beasts or flies [maybe an adaptation of what drought does to fit this theme?]
(Exodus 9:1–7) disease on livestock [lose a pig and/or negate pig farms]
(Exodus 9:8–12) unhealable boils [maybe something like Quarantine…or is that Pestilence already?]
(Exodus 9:13–35) hail mixed with fire [a Meteor tile and/or an eruption]
(Exodus 10:1–20) locusts [Swarm of locusts tile hurting farmers]
(Exodus 10:21–29) darkness [some sort of Eclipse tile]
(Exodus 11:1–12:36) death of the first-born of all Egyptian families. (also death of every camel) [lose a meeple…maybe the most potentially valuable because it’s the “first-born” to whom goes all the inheritance]

That’s just a thought it we went with 10 plagues.  If we did do that theme though…what if there were 10 tiles with a plague icon.  When the first is drawn and played…with the player having a chance to place on any features, then the first plague goes into effect.  Plagues involving tiles would have those set aside to use when needed and then some plagues might simply be an effect on everyone like the death of the first born idea of everyone loses a meeple.

So the ten plagues would all hit in order but you never know just when.  They could be the first ten tiles played or the last.

Also, if this 10 plagues theme were to be used I think there should be a way for the players to escape it through showing their faith somehow much like lambs blood on the door frame saved the Israelites from losing their firstborn.  Maybe as long as a player has 2 monks in play (cloister, abbey, whatever) they are safe or something like that.  Hmmm…after typing it out I do see that this would require all the disasters to be 1 time influences to be avoided or a lot of monks on unfinished cloisters.

Well this is all just brainstorming and throwing out ideas anyway. Sorry its so long.

I'm not sure of the viability of having the 10 Plagues of Egypt effect Carcassonne, but if we go with this or something similar, I have a few ideas. First, I think that the plague should only effect the player who draws the tile but there should be no protection for them. That means that when a player draws a Plague/Disaster tile, they must place it on their own feature, if possible. Now, based on your list:

• Bloody river would be hard to do without requiring one of the River expansions. Penalties for fields are already noted below for other plagues, so I think the bloody river should effect roads (i.e., trade). The bloody river would be more like a bloody pond and negate an entire road for the player but not end the road (i.e., the follower would have to stay on it unless by placing the tile it completed the road).
  
• Frogs should be similar to the above except it should act as the end of a road with frogs all over it, thereby blocking the end. In other words, your follower is permanently trapped on that road.
• Gnats should force a player to remove a Farmer and return it to their supply (you can't work if gnats are attacking you, after all!).
• Flies should attack a Knight and force the player to return one to their supply.
• Death of livestock, in lieu of a better option, should force the player to subtract some amount from their score; I'd recommend 10 points. Without livestock, a major producer of food which supports farmers, cities, cloisters, and travelers on roads, I think people would die off. Not that the other plagues didn't do this too or anything, but vanilla carc has no livestock to kill.
  
• Boils should reduce the value of a city by 1.
• Firestorm should be a tile that goes on the board and blocks all sides without completing adjacent features (an anti-abbey).
• Locusts should reduce the value of a field by 1/city.
• Darkness should force a player to return to his/her supply all monks/heretics since religious figures are very superstitious.
• Death of the Firstborn should remove one meeple from a players supply or board PERMANENTLY (remove it from the game).

As with most expansion ideas, I strongly urge you to try and use only tiles from the base game for bonuses/penalties. Requiring players to use your expansion with an official expansion just for the benefit of one specific action is really annoying (at least to me). I think we could think of 10 plague ideas without having to resort to tiles from official/unofficial expansions.

Thats a good point. I agree with keeping it to non expansion specific tiles.  Just brainstorming.  :)

While I'm very much on board with a 10 plagues expansion.  I think it would be better used with the Ark version.  We had discussed that in the Ark thread and I think that where it belongs.  Perhaps we can persue that idea when we finish this one. 

That said, I think we should stick to the ideas we've mentioned so far plus whatever we come up with that's new.  Good job though coming up with all that info.  It won't be wasted!  :-]

I agree to leave the 10 plagues for AotC.

I'm fine with that.  I forget about the spinoffs since I don't have any.

If the disaster only affects the player who drew it then perhaps for each disaster there should be at least the chance of protection. Just my opinion but I wouldn't really want to use an expansion that only introduced negative consequences to gameplay, unless players can profit from anothers misfortune *rubs hands together and cackles maniacally*  ;l7.

For example if a player draws a flood, perhaps other players could assist him to combat it, so maybe they could give him some 'sandbag tokens' in their colour or something and then whoever has assisted others in distress the most would get rewarded at the end of the game. But also tailor it so players have to strategise whether or not they want to assist others because they might need the tokens themselves if they draw a flood. Or something like that. But anyway I think I'd prefer something that encouraged cooperation rather than just dealt damage to an individual. There should be some benefit in there for someone, otherwise it'd just be disheartening to play with in my opinion.

I'm not sure I like they tile only effecting the one who draws it.  That's not so with the Drought and Pestilence.  i think we should stay with that "mechanic theme."

Well that works too. Alternatively perhaps everyone except the person who draws the tile is affected. Although since they are tiles for plagues, I'd assume that they would be placed meaning that they could then affect whoever is adjacent to the placed tile.

I agree that the expansion as a whole should go with AotC but I think at least some of the plagues are natural disasters in themselves and should be included. Most of the plagues of Egypt have been hypothetically linked to the eruption of Mt. Thera in the Aegean Sea. Regardless of if the plagues actually occurred, I think that we could still use some of the plagues as just natural disasters. Gnats and eclipses and livestock deaths and the black death have all happened in Europe outside of a divine plague.

• 10 Plagues

I really like this idea. Although I like the idea that there is the same plague icon on each tile and that the plagues happen in a specific order when each plague tile is drawn.  And I was also thinking about having effects of the plague work similar to the Wheel of Fortune where it affects everyone.  This plague everyone has to remove a knight from a city, the next plague everyone removes a pig, just for a couple examples.  But if this is better suited for AotC, then that's fine.  I'll have to see if I can find the AotC thread through, because I don't think I've seen that.

So to get back on track with the suggestions listed by CKorfmann:

• 6-12 tiles

As long as there aren't too many rules, I'd say 12 is a good number.

• Possibly including the Drought and Pestilance expansion

Although I do think Natural Disasters should be its own expansion, these tiles do seem to fit quite well.

• Possibly including the Forest Fire tile

I'm against this one, especially since it was mentioned earlier to try not to include tile specific happenings from other expansions, so it should definitely not include tiles where you HAVE to use tiles from fan-based expansions, especially the large expansions like Forest.

• A Meteor tile

A meteor seems quite random. Granted other things have been suggested for this tile, here's my idea:
Use a tile that has a meteor symbol on.  Who ever draws this tile may place it as normal, but also remove a follower off the board from the player in first place and return it to their supply.

• Some sort of Eclipse tile

I like the idea of everyone having to remove a monk or heretic.

• A Flood tile (or tiles, or large tile)

I like the idea of it starting as 1x1, and then later replace it with 3x3.  I'd skip having a 2x2 tile.

• An Earthquake tile

Although putting a gap in the board would be awesome, it would be too much work to physically do. I'd imagine it'd also cause many already completed features to become unfinished again, and it'd be too easy to re-score a ton of points with just a single tile.  Since earthquake tend to be more sufficient at destroying towns, perhaps everyone having to remove a knight would be more appropriate.

• A Swarm of Locusts tile

Perhaps locusts can be like a princess tile except have it work for the farmers.

• A Tornado tile (or meeple)

I still like my orginal idea of using this as a meeple, or a wooden disc would probably work the best.  And having it move similar to a dragon, except it transfers meeples to different sections rather than eating them.

• A Hurricane tile (similar to The Ocean - Turbulent Waters)

I vote against a hurricane tile.  There are no oceans or large bodies of water around that are big enough to create a hurricane.

HERE (http://www.carcassonnecentral.com/forum/index.php?topic=620.0) you go.

That was my inspiration for the idea.  I thought it "natural" that they be included.  :-]  I'm flexible though.

I thought this one would be a given as well, but I see why you might not want to include it.  Perhaps we can make a 15 tile set and save the last three for expansion features such as the Forest Fire.  I think JPutt did something similar to this with the Fortune Teller.  He had 6 regular tiles and two extra with forest and mountain features.  Would using the Flood tile on the River be considered the same way though?

I hadn't thought of the possibility.  At the very least, I can see it becoming a project trying to avoid the issue.

I think I'm with you on the Hurricane thing.  Not a likely occurance in this part of the world.  Perhaps we could use something like it for the Tornado tile.  I like the idea of the tornado carrying a meeple and depositing it elsewhere. 

As much as I like the idea of a sequential series of plagues, I still think it belongs with the AotC spin-off.  My original idea for the Natural Disasters was someting much more random.  However, I'm flexible if there is a concensus.

I agree with skipping the 2x2 tile.  My concern with this one is the outside edge of the flood tile.  Would it be bordered like an abbey to aleviate the problems of features matching up?  And then would you say any feature dead ending into it is complete like an abbey or incomplete and people are trapped by the flood.  I kind of like that idea but that makes this becomes really powerful considering it also knocked out whatever meeples and features were in the flooded 3x3 area.

I vote for having it surrounded by a wall like the Abbey, although I like the border that is on the hurricane tile from the Ocean expansion: Turbulent Waters.  And I'd say that it finishes the features that it touches. And the flood tile(s) can count toward the completion of a cloister or shrine as long as that cloister or shrine does not get flooded out, and the dragon should be allowed to move across the flooded area.

We could turn the Meteor into a whole Meteor Shower...when the tile is drawn the player fires the catapult with every single chit stacked on top.  Whatever tiles are hit are removed from the game!  ;D

(Totally just kidding)

In all honesty though...concerning the proposed tornado piece...

With the possibility of a tornado piece moving meeples around, were people thinking of this as a one time thing that goes until a meeple is moved or a reoccuring thing like the dragon which would require several tiles with a tornado symbol that shows its on the move again. I'm assuming the latter to justify a piece being introduced.  In that case though, how many tiles would this require to make it useful.

What if there were several tiles with that icon and the player places the tile and then the tornado moves the wood for them and moves around until it hits another meeple and switches them, or just hits an unclaimed feature and deposits them (which isn't really disasterful I guess, just random...so we'll stick with the already proposed switching of meeples).

When I came up with the tornado idea, I just thought it sounded like a good idea.  I didn't think too much about how the mechanics would work in the game.  So here's some ideas for the movement of the tornado:

1. It could be moved whenever any natural disaster tile is drawn (that way we wouldn't have to make a bunch of extra tiles for the tornado). In this case, it could move similar to the dragon, or some other method of movement, perhaps an auto-switch with the nearest follower (in case of tie, the player that placed the tile decides which follower to exchange)?

or

2. Have the player choose to move the tornado instead of placing a follower or related action.  Move the tornado 6 spaces or until you get to another follower?

If it's going to get a lot of use there could be 2 spinnies to determine the strength of the tornado (spaces to be moved) and the direction to be moved

(http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/1323/tornadoc.jpg)

With weather conditions changing its path each time it would be more like a real tornado.

That's a great idea too!  I think I like that one, although I'd much rather use dice.  Perhaps a 1d6 for movement, and 1d4 for direction.  Although d4 isn't very common, we could use a d6 for direction, say 1-4=N, S, E, W; 5=it travels the 8 surrounding tiles; 6=it travels to the nearest follower.

Wow, miss one day and there's a lot to catch up on. 

First, I think it would be appropriate to establish the basic idea of the series.  My original idea was to model the mechanics of the Drought and Pestilence expansion.  These tiles are drawn and placed by one person and effect everyone who's features they touch.  The person drawing the tile is unlikely to place the "natural disaster" on themselves.  So in essence, it's a disaster for everyone else (unless, of course, the placement options are so limited that they drawer has no choice by to play it on themselves), and as with real life, you can do little to stop it.  Keeping that in mind...

Regarding the Meteor:
I love the idea of using the catapult even if it was a joke.  Perhaps we could use a projectile to determine the placement of the meteor.
 
Regarding the Tornado:
It does seem logical that an event like a drawn tile should move the tornado.  It also seems logical that there should be more than one of these, but I'm wondering if we could figure out a way to make it work with just one tile.  The spinners look cool and they would work well, but it would be something extra to print and some people (like me) don't have/can't find the chip board for it.  What if it was one tile, the tornado came out just once and worked something like this.  The tornado moves a maximum of X spaces/tiles (the dragon moves 6).  Everyone takes a turn moving it (continuing in game order) and any time it crosses the path of a meeple, it carries that meeple until it crosses the path of another and switches.  The final resting place of the tornado is where the last meeple is dropped.  My initial thought for X was 12 so that everyone has an opportunity to move the tornado twice regardless of the number of players, but that seems like a lot if you're only playing with 3 people.  We could just say that play continues until everyone moves it twice, but then it wouldn't move very far when playing with only 2.  So, shall we solve for X?  (I knew algebra was going to be useful!)  :-]

Regarding the Flood:
I'm in favor of skipping the 2x2 and going straight to the 3x3 as well.  I think I agree with most of what's been said.  The placing of the 3x3 tile should destroy anything it replaces, but not destroy the things outside it.  I'm thinking though that nothing should be able to be completed that runs into it like a city, road, and for continuity's sake, probably a cloister/shrine as well.  This has no bearing on the tiles that are outside the flooded area though, so the untouched tiles around a cloister could still be scored.  If we are beginning the flood on the river, it's unlikely that it could effect many cloisters anyway.  The flood would obviously be of no consequence to already completed features.  The boarder to me signifies completion as with the abbey, ghetto, etc.  I feel like under the circumstances, we should skip the border.

What if for X…the Tornado starts on whatever tile begins it and it moves in the traditional manner of the dragon (each player moving once, never cross the same spot), swapping meeples as it goes, until it reaches some given condition.  Several possible would be:
- It reaches a dead end (in which case the still suspended meeple is returned to the player’s supply)
- It crosses an incomplete yet unclaimed feature where it is then deposited
- It moves Y number of meeples (where Y is the number of players or something like that)
This could lead to either very long Tornado movement or very short, which is random but to me that seems okay for a disaster…you don’t know what it will do.  It seems to me this could save having to make extra spinners or add dice, which could both solve the problem but is simply that much more stuff one has to have/make. 

Regarding the Flood:

Am I understanding correctly then that the flooded area is for all intents and purposes a "dead zone" for points but does NOT stop completion of surrounding features? So if a cloister (C) is middle right to the Flood (F) then it can still be completed but only gets 6 points (5 Point scoring tiles (P) + the cloister itself)?
TTTTTT
FFFPPT
FFFCPT
FFFPPT
TTTTTT
And if a road or a city end up dead ending into the flooded area it is considered a road end or a finish to the city on that side? So all together any feature is open to being flooded and then it still affects size of roads, cities, farms and even cloister scoring area. Am I understanding this right CKorfmann?

Flood:
I'm understanding that if a road or city runs into the flood, then it can not be completed.  Also, if a cloister needs a tile that is occupied by the flood, then it can not be completed.  I'd imagine that if there are still followers on the features at the end of the game, then those features would score like normal at the end of the game, with the flood still not being able to count towards points of a cloister.

Tornado:
Moving a tornado in a 2 player game with players taking turns is almost pointless.  For example, the dragon doesn't eat very many followers in a 2 player game unless the player has no option but to move the dragon towards his own follower.  Another option would be to move the tornado from it's current location to the location of the tile last placed that is a natural disaster tile, switching any followers in it's path.  That would give the player placing the tile a little bit of control over the tornado.

Meteor:
I like the idea of using the catapult to determine the placement of the meteor, but it's a pain to use.  Last time I used it just for fun, it took about 10 shots before I even got the catapult token to land on the board!  Plus, I'm going to guess that most people don't have the Catapult expansion.

Personally I like this idea of the features running into the flood being incomplete and meeples getting "trapped" by the flood. This could trap a lot of meeples though and make it much more damaging. It seems that comments in the thread have gone both ways on this issue though the replacing of a 3x3 area of the board with a flood tile is generally accepted. Perhaps we could put that issue to a vote so we can move on to fleshing out this disasters rules.

Option 1: Flood knocks out just the 3x3 grid but then is considered a completion to whatever runs into it.
Option 2: Flood knocks out the 3x3 grid and then is considered an incomplete egde/end to whatever runs into it, trapping any meeples connected.

I vote Option 2.

I'm with you for option 2.  My initial thought was that in the senerio used for example, that the cloister would only be worth 6 points, but that the follower would be returned at that point.  I guess it makes a lot more sense to leave the follower there if the feature is technically incomplete as it would be with a city or road. 

The tornado movement is still a mystery to me.  I agree that I  find the dragon just about useless in a two-player game.  Here is one of my earlier ideas, what do you think of it?  Everyone moves the tornado two spaces at a time (typical dragon type movements).  Total number of spaces could be 12 or two times around, which ever comes first.

I think I was the only one that brought up option 1, but option 2 is fine.

For the tornado, let's keep it like the dragon where it is moved 6 times, except each player can move it 3 spaces, so that's a total of 18 spaces.  Although it would move a lot farther than the dragon, it's still not quite as devastating since it just moves pieces around, and doesn't eat them.

18 seems a little high to me.  Depending on when the tile shows up, there might not be 18 spaces.  What does everyone else think?

Maybe 18 is too many?  Can you tell I've been playing too many games of Mega-Carcassonne? (http://gwommy.homestead.com/files/PurpleSmileTongue.gif)

18 is pretty powerful potential for changing the game.  But at the same time it sounds like the tornado is just going to happen once (not repeatedly as considered at one point) and even with moving 18 I'd still think its not as damaging as the flood disaster idea.  Honestly I'd be okay with 18, without ever hitting the same tile twice, and each player moving 3 each time it comes to them (though that could well give one person the easy power to dead end this if they want to...hmmm). If its decided the tornado is triggered multiple times then I would vote for less.

This does put flood and tornado on a slightly higher level of chaos, mass panic, social reform, fire and brimstone then drought and pestilence I would think from reading their rules, but I haven't played those yet so perhaps not.

Time to re-cap.

Here's a list of the suggested tiles and quantities:

1-Meteor
1-Earthquake
1-Flood(+9 for 3x3 tile)
?-Drought
?-Pestilence
?-Locust
?-Volcano Eruption
?-Eclipse
?-Tornado or just the wooden tornado disc.

Next, let's figure out what each tile/piece is going to do.  I tried to compiled a list of the suggestions, it is somewhat rushed, so I may have missed some:

1. *METEOR*
1A. Tile is placed like an Abbey, all surrounding features are completed.
1B. Tile can be used to replace any tile in play (except special start tiles such as City of Carcassonne or Wheel of Fortune).
1C. Catapult a handful of tokens at the board as a meteor shower.
1D. Other?

2. *EARTHQUAKE*
2A. Separate the playing area into two sections spreading them far enough apart to fit a landscape tile between them.
2B. As earthquakes are more likely to destroy buildings, each player should remove a knight from a city (if they have one).
2C. New idea: Split the area into two sections with a straight line, treat this line as if it was a single Abbey wall, any features that touches the line are considered ended.  A cloiser against the wall may only score 6 points.
2D. Other?

3. *FLOOD*
3A. Play as 1x1 tile.
3B. After next turn, switch it out for 3x3 flood tile.
3C. Flood tile may only be played on a river space.
3D. Flood spaces trap followers and makes features unable to be completed.
3E. Other?

If we were to use just these 3 features, then technically, that's 12 tiles.  Then we'd just need to figure out a condition that is to be met for figuring out the movement of the tornado, like every time a city is completed, or choosing to move the tornado instead of placing a follower.

4. *DROUGHT*
4A. Causes a farm to score -1 per completed city.
4B. Tiles should be different from the original expansion.
4C. How many tiles to use for this?

5. *PESTILENCE* (Rat infestation)
5A. Causes followers and builders to remain in a city even after it is completed.
5B. Would this still be consindered a natural disaster?
5C. How many tiles (if any)?

6. *LOCUST*
6A. Remove a farmer from the field that it is placed in (similar to the princess tile).
6B. How many tiles?

7. *VOLCANO ERUPTION*
7A. Possible destruction around surrounding tiles.
7B. Omit?
7C. Other ideas?

8. *ECLIPSE*
8A. Each player removes a monk when played.
8B. New idea: Using the scoring from the Wheel of Fortune, each player gets +2 for each monk/heretic for a solar eclipse, and -2 for lunar eclipse. (Although chances are that this will probably even itself out)
8C. How many of each tile?
8D. Other ideas?

9. *TORNADO*
9A. Acts as a neutral meeple, represented by a wooden disc.
9B. During it's movement, 6 players take turns moving it 2 spaces each.
9C. It carries followers until it reaches another follower, then the two followers are swapped.
9D. Swap with the nearest follower to the tornado?
9E. Have a symbol on each of the tiles above to determine when the tornado moves?
9F. Other

Wow, that's an excellent, concise recap.  Well done!  :)

If we were to go with a 15 tile sheet, that would give us the Flood plus 5 tiles (two of them could be one each of Drought and Pestilence).  Here are my preferences.  Take them for what they are worth...

Eclipse: I don't think I'm in favor of an eclipse tile.  I doesn't seem disastrous enough to me.  It's more of a special event.

Tornado: My preference would be for one tile to indicate the starting place of the tornado round.  The tornado is placed there and movement begins as suggested.  Then the tornado is gone, quick and painful for some, painless for others, pretty much just like real life. 

Flood: Seems like we've got this one under control.  If it wasn't stated before, I feel like the single flood tile should replace an existing river tile destroying whatever happens to be on it and possibly rendering some feature(s) incomplete.  Do you think the 3x3 tile should be centered on the original flood tile, or should that be left to the discretion of the one placing it?

Volcano: While a very viable option, it seems to be one of my least favorite.  I don't know why, perhaps it's just because we don't really have any ideas for mechanics yet.

Earthquake: While it may arguably make the most sense of any, I could take this one or leave it.  Probably also because of the multitude of ideas.  I'd be interested in hearing a really good idea for it.

Meteor: This is one of my favorites.  I feel like this mechanic should be like the originial flood tile.  It is one tile that can be placed anywhere on the playing area, replacing any one tile already in play and destroying whatever happens to be on the tile possibly rendering some feature(s) incomplete.  I also really like the random placement possibility of the catapult, but we could make that optional. 

Locusts: I think this, if played along with Drought, could be too farmer-specific.  Most, if not all of the other disasters could effect the farmers as well, so I might not mind cutting this one out unless we end up needing one.

I'd like to up it to 18 tiles:
10 flood
2 meteor
2 drought
2 tornado
1 pestilence
1 earthquake

I really my idea for earthquake to split the board in 2 and treat it as an abbey wall.  It'll split up features and allow them to become unclaimed with the original follower now trapped on the other side of the board.

I'm not sure I follow you?  How are you splitting the board?

The board should be searated by a straight line like how you originally suggested.  The player that places the tile gets to choose where to divide the board.  The board only needs to be separated a by a small gap, or alternatively, you could mark the separation with a piece of yarn (or noticable string).

We may want to pick a different way to determine where the earthquake goes as well.  Seeing how (if we use it) there will only be one tile, letting a single player determine the fate of the game may be too much (opinions?).  Alternately, perhaps the player can choose to place the gap along one of the four edges of either the starting tile and/or the placement of the earthquake tile, as that would make it slightly less powerful.  If using the Count or Wheel of Fortune, you can't place the line so that it splits those starting tiles.

==EDIT==
Anyone willing to start working on making some or all of the tiles?

The Drought and Pestilance expansion has 5 symbols of the first and 2 of the second.  Are we talking about adding a few more in this expansion to be used in addition to the other expansion or to be used to a smaller degree in this Disaster mix.  I don’t know what discussion went into making Drought and Pestilance in the first place that brought you to decide on the number you did. But that seems like a lot of drought if we add 2 more, making 7 droughts in the game. Though more pestilence could be okay probably.  Though they both affect farmers, I’d be more inclined to add Locusts as a new disaster then add more of an already existent one (drought).  Or even just 1 of each.

Meteor Strike:
It seems that the mechanic of the meteor is simply a one tile version of what the 3x3 flood does (causing damage and making neighboring features incomplete).  It’s just placed differently.  This has me inclined to have multiple meteors to put it on a similar scope as the flood.  I’d say for sure 2 and maybe even 3 or 4.  I’m not sure how effective or liked this rule would be but what if instead of using the catapult or letting someone pick where it goes, you flip a chit (like flipping a coin) starting centered over the starting tile (or the tile that designates a meteor strike) and wherever it lands is the hit tile.  I’d see this though as a normal tile with an icon marking a meteor strike and a separate impact crater tile set aside that is the meteor itself and used when the other tile is drawn.  But I guess if that requires 2 tiles then to have multiple meteors would be 2 tiles x however many meteors you want.  Unless there is one meteor strike tile (normal tile with a symbol that indicates meteor strike) and 3 impact crater tiles and you flip 3 chits/coins at once to see where they all land.  So it would be 4 tiles but a one time event in the game.

Tornado:
If there are multiple tornados I think 12 is a good number to move each time.

Flood: There had been earlier discussion about not requiring any other expansion to play this.  Technically the River is an expansion (though I almost always use it myself).  I’m fine basing the rule off the river, but since we had that discussion about expansions I just wanted to see if any one does have a concern with that…though I don’t personally.

I’m not entirely sure where any of the above thoughts would put the tile count.  Maybe this should be a series too.  ;D

As always, I try am trying to focus on the overall theme of Carcassonne and this expansion hits and misses sometimes with that theme. Earthquakes are alright because they can technically happen anywhere, although they are quite rare and weak around southeast France. Volcanoes, however, are regional events that don't effect anywhere in Europe except Iceland, Italy and some Greek Isles. I don't think a volcano tile should be included (I know, Princess & the Dragon already has ones, but I disagree with those too). Just my two cents. The rest of the expansion seems to be developing well.

Oh! Don't discount having an Eclipse a disaster; medieval monks who had poor knowledge of natural phenomenon often thought eclipses were an omen, which suggests to me that they at least appeared to be natural disasters, even if they didn't destroy anything.

Perhaps you are right.  I am thinking that the same thing that is being done in the Roman expansion should be done here. We should leave out Drought and Pestilence, especially since we have enough other things to make this an expansion work well (Meteor, Tornado, Earthquake and Flood).  We should just focus on those 4 items.  Surely we can mention in the rules that the Drought and Pestilence expansion works well with this one.

So, I guess that could put us back down to a 15 tile expansion.  Here is my proposed tile distribution:
10 flood
2 meteor
2 tornado
1 earthquake

=FLOOD
I usually use the river as well (unless playing with the Wheel of Fortune).  So if you are using the river, then this has to replace a river tile.  Alternately, we can add a rule that if you're not playing the river, then you may place this tile anywhere that you want.

=TORNADO
I can agree that as long as there's at least 2 tornados then moving it 12 spaces should be enough.

=METEOR
I have another idea for placement of the meteor.  When the tile is drawn, the player will choose a tile where he/she wants to place it, the next player will choose a tile orthogonally adjacent. Each player does this until it gets back to the player that placed the meteor tile where he/she will also get a chance to select an orthogonally adjacent tile for final placement of the meteor.  Much like the dragon movement, a player can not select a tile that was previously selected by a player in that turn.

=EARTHQUAKE
What do people think of my latest idea for this (a few posts back)?  Although I like it, we could disregard the earthquake and add another meteor tile.  Although it'd be weird having 3 meteors hit the region of Carcassonne in such a small time frame while playing. (http://gwommy.homestead.com/files/PurpleSmileTongue.gif)

Concerning the current earthquake proposal that basically  puts a big abbeyesque wall through the board…

I really like the idea of a separation dead ending and splitting features.  I really like the idea of partial points for the cloister. 

Some concerns I would have though would be clear rules of placement…I think that connecting to the starting tile could be good to keep some randomness and not pure malicious destruction on the part of the player.  Also, how long is this fissure?  Is it an indefinite distance, therefore separating the whole playing area effectively into two separate boards or is it a designated number of tiles that can then be build around on either end.  Say for example, the fissure is 8 tiles long but at the 9th tile you can connect your farm/road/city around again. For example [|] is the fissure.  At the top and bottom no fissure exists and those can connect.

T T
T|T
T|T
T|T
T|T
T|T
T|T
T|T
T|T
T T

What was your intent. In this regard.

=EARTHQUAKE
My intent was for the line to be indefinite to keep the board separated into two pieces for the rest of the game. Although, making a fault line a specific distance is a good idea as well.  Although 8 tiles long may be too hard to keep track of, especially early in the game.  But a length of 4 tiles sounds more reasonable.

=METEOR
Here's my attempt at making a meteor tile:
(http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/Meteor.jpg)

Perhaps this could be the inspiration for another expansion similar to Disasters that is perhaps not quite as catastrophic in nature. "Signs and Omens" perhaps, including eclipse and other such unexplained (at the time) phenomenon.

I apologize, I didn't mean to seem like I was ignoring this.  I do like the idea, but it doesn't seem to fit as well with the other natural disasters.  And Loganmann's suggestion for "Signs and Omen" is a good one, probably better than my idea for it.  I was thinking about integrating it with an expansion that I was thinking about to add day and night into Carcassonne, perhaps something similar to the "Seasons" expansion.

As for Drought and Pestilance, I always thought there were too many drought tiles.  I don't there there should be more of those than there are pig tiles.  Two at most.  My thought was to include one of each in our expansion. 

I kinda like the earthquake idea.  It's very much like my original idea, as you've noted.  It might be difficult to do, especially if it's late in the game, but not impossible. 

I might be incommunicado for a few days as we're traveling.  Keep up the good work gents!

=DROUGHT AND PESTILENCE
Are there any other opinions for this as to whether we should include it or not?  I still say we can add a note in the rules to include the drought and pestilence expansion with this one.  We could even describe it as having a custom difficulty similar to how Pandemic works with the 'epidemic' cards.  For those not familiar with that game, basically the more epidemic cards you add into the deck, then the harder the game becomes.  So, we could say for an average game, select 2 of the drought tiles from the Drought & Pest. expansion, for a more viscious game, use all 6 tiles.

=EARTHQUAKE
It shouldn't be hard to do if you're just laying a piece of yarn somewhere along the seems of the tiles in a straight line.  You wouldn't have to actually move the tiles at all that way.  I still haven't heard anyone else's opinion as to whether it should go across the whole board or if it should be a limited length, say 7 inches (which is 4 tiles long).

<EDIT>========================================================
I came up with a symbol for the earthquake tile:
(http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/EarthquakeSymbol.gif)
And here's a sample tile (I don't know if we'd want to use a CCCC tile or not though):
(http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/EarthquakeSample.gif)
</EDIT>========================================================

=FLOOD
I'm not having much luck making the flood tiles.  Anyone else want to give it a try?

=TORNADO
Does anyone have any tile layout preferences for the tornado tiles?  I'm thinking it should be a normal tile with a tornado symbol similar to the dragon.

About the Earthquake, to make it simpler: any city touching a earthquake tile doesnt count as being completed (think as the city being destroyed at the end of the game), this would deny points to the farmers and substract points to the king. Can be scored if completed during the game, but not extra points at the end of the game.

As I mentioned before an earthquake  doesnt affect a straight line (thats the most vissible effect of it) but affect a round area from his origin point. Treating like that, is just making it a crevasse, oh just move to one side of the crevasse and we are safe, not that easy.

I like the earthquake symbol :)

The earthquake symbol is great.  Maybe you could use JPutt's lake expansion as a template for the flood.

I like that idea as well, as it does seem to make more sense then a straight line.  The only flaw is that it is similar to Seige tile where farms score x2 at the end of the game, because in my experience, I keep forgetting to add the bonus to the farms from the seige when the time comes.  But like I said, that's just me.  I'll still support this idea though.

I tried, but had minimal luck.  I suppose I can try again, but that'll have to wait until tomorrow.

Hallo to all, greetings from Germany,javascript:void(0);

what's about a transparent tile for the Flood, with you lay on top of the tile near the river or a lake?

markus javascript:void(0);

Thanks Marcus, that's a great idea.  I've redone the graphic from the lake expansion and cleared out the surrounding city, and other misc items.  I was wondering how to make it more square, but with that idea, it won't be necessary.  I think that making it a cut-out piece and pasting it to a thin, sturdy cardboard would work perfectly.  Then it can be placed on top of the tiles and we wouldn't have to worry about features not lining up correctly.  The 1x1 tile will still have to be made into a tile like normal though.

Well, to keep in mind which cities will suffer a earthquake and wont be counted at the end of the game, maybe a token with the earthquake symbol can be created in order to be put on the cities as a remainder.

==EARTHQUAKE
I was thinking about using tokens too.  Because if I used tokens for Seige, then I'd know that I'd only have to make 4.  But then how many would we need for the earthquake?  How big of an area is going to be affected by the earthquake?  2 spaces in any direction from where the tile is placed? Maybe have 8 tokens?

==FLOOD
Here's the flood cut-out that would replace the 3x3 tile.  What do we think? Print it out, glue it to a piece of posterboard, and cut it out. Of course, cutting it out will be the tedious part.
(http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/FloodCutOut.jpg)

Hallo again,

what do you think about a dice, earthquake are getting measured one the richter-scale.
So you can throw a sixer-dice: 1&2: light - using only the draw tile; 3&4 medium the 4 tiles in a cross are demaged and 5&6 the 8 tiles around the epicenter became the token.

Greetings Markus

PS: 1. It's a great and wonderfull side and I'm very happy that I found it.
      2. After month of quiet reading I'm glade that my Idea is usefull
      3. Please excuse my english mistakes, but my schoolenglish is seldom used and maybe older than some of you.  ;)

It's Me again

in addition of my last reply,
I think it's a nice flood, but instad of cutting and gluing, isn't it posible to print it direct on a transparent priter-ability foil?

Markus

Hi Markus, sincerely I dont have problems with die rolls, but most of the Carcassonne players will freak out by the idea of using a die in a Carcassonne game.

What can be done is; depending on the number of expansion being used on the game, make the earthquake more or less powerful.

Gwommy, I think 8 tokens shall be enough, but you can never be sure. Some game you will end with more than 8 cities affected by the earthquake, but 8 should make a good number.

=EARHTQUAKE
I'm not against die rolling either, but like Elmendalerenda said, many don't like it.  How about when the earthquake tile is drawn, the tile gets flipped like a coin.  If it lands face down then the earthquake affects 1 row of surrounding tiles (9 tiles).  If it lands face up, then it affects 2 rows of surrounding tiles (25 tiles). Then the tile can be placed.

=FLOOD
I don't access to a transparency printer, but the graphic is there and the players can print it out however they like.  Although I may be a little leary as to print it on pransparency paper because there are some white spots in the lake/flood that may not show up properly.  Also I don't see the transparency paper being heavy enough to stay in place, someone could just breathe on it and move it out of place.

25 tiles, thats a lot of destruction and almost sure 8 tokens wont be enough. On the other side the flipping idea seems pretty cool.

Maybe if the tile lands face up, affects the 8 surrounding tiles plus 4 extra orthogonal tiles, this makes 13 tiles in total, accounting that the earthquake effect tends to be circular and the tiles are squared, diagonally the distance is longer.

    X
  XXX
XXXXX
  XXX
    X

I think I like the 13 tile idea.  It seems to be the most appropriate.  I also think that placing a token on a city would be a good way to serve as a reminder.  The number is a mystery, but 8 will likely be enough most of the time.

Something I thought about the earthquake;

After placing the earthquake tile on the board, if cities are build later in the area of effect, would they be affected at the end of the game as well by the earthquake? It wont be such a drawback because cites are scored normally when completed, the only problem is regarding the farmer who scores one point less per crumbled city. Players still be interested in developing these areas, even if other player has farmer majority, because he will score less for those cities. (Like San Francisco, everybody knows that there will be a big earthquake, but they still live there).

Also if a city in the earthquake area is not completed how is scored at the end of the game?

Just asking for ideas, because somebody will come with this questions at some point of the development.

What if the earthquake doesn't actually happen until before final scoring.  The Earthquake tile can still be placed as normal during the game. And I think that perhaps the unfinished cities that touch an earthquake zone should not score any points.

Completed cities in the earthquake effect should be penalized somehow.

Other crazy idea; when a player completes a city under the earthquake area he can give a earthquake token to any of the players with meeples in that town. At the end of the game the player witht he most earthquake tokens loses 10 points. If you complete a town and you are the only player with meeples there, you get the earthquake token.

Also cities unfinished in the earthquake area dont score at the end of the game.

This way we can forget the farmer penalty idea and tracking the earthquake effect will be easier, maybe making 10 earthquake tiles will be enough.

The end of the month is quickly sneaking upon us. I figured I'd at least get a rough draft written.  Remember, nothing here is written in stone.  Anything may still be changed at this point. Here's what I've come up with so far:
http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasters.pdf (http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasters.pdf)

After the rules, the next biggest thing to decide is tile layout.  Assuming that we're only using 6 tiles, heres what I suggest for a breakdown:
1-earthquake
1-flood
2-meteor
2-tornado

Unless someone comes up with a tile that they like better, the meteor is done.

Same thing for the flood, right now I just have an edited lake tile.  Although it may not match up on all sides with the rest of the board, it'll only be for one then it'll get covered with the cut-out and then it won't matter what the flood tile looks like.

For the earthquake, is a CCCC piece okay to use?  Are there any suggestions to use something else?  What about a CCCC piece with a field in the center separating the tile into 4 different cities?

Finally, what 2 tiles configurations should we use for the tornado tiles?

I've heard some people having issues with the amount of CCCC tiles already available with fan-made expansions.  I'd stay away from that one.  I don't think it matter either way what the tile layout is otherwise.  Something random perhaps...

Yep, better make the earthquake tile a ffff without any feature, that way the number of potential cities can be keep managed. At the most a fffc tile. The poor meeples have to be very unlucky to have the earthquake epicenter under their city  :'(

The earthquake should affect cities on the corners of the earthquake tile as well, remember.
    X
  XXX
XXOXX
  XXX
    X
The rest seems good so far, sorry didnt checked the spelling

I've found a couple of things that may need correcting:

Page 2, annotation 5: "... owner's supply. (example: A mayor may not be ..."
  Should be: "... owner's supply. (Example: A mayor may not be ..."

Page 3, Final Scoring section: "If a finished city has a earthquake marker ..."
  Should be: "If a finished city has an earthquake marker ..."


Also, I'm not sure if it's my viewer or something in the document but at 100% all of the lower-case a's appear as if they are in a larger point size. At other percentages they all appear the correct size. Weird.  F:) :??

Here's first edit.  Let me know if I can change it to final.  Also, a link for the tiles:

http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasters.pdf (http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasters.pdf)
http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasterTiles.pdf (http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasterTiles.pdf)

I have a few suggested changes:

Under the Earthquake section of Place a Tile:

Under the Flood section of Place a Tile:

Under the Meteor section of Place a Tile:

Under the Deploy a follower section:

Under the Score section:

Under the Final Scoring section:

Cool, thanks!  All suggestions taken except for one:
When talking about a single player, 'they' should not be used as a pronoun.  Colloquially, it's common usage, but grammatically, 'he/she' should be used, or perhaps just 'he'.

The updated version can be found on the same link as posted above.

Not to start a grammar war, but the use of "they" to denote a neuter singular is becoming increasingly accepted by academics and professionals as proper grammar, not just colloquial speech. It was when linguists started pointing out a few years back that "they" was in fact originally both a singular and plural neuter pronoun that the academic community started to relent their roughly three century long reign of masculinity. Many people these days, conscious (or subconscious) of the gender revolution of the 1960s and 70s, feel uncomfortable using "he" for both male and neuter pronouns and the increasing return of "they" as the neuter is a clear sign that the reign of "he" is ending. I see no problem with using "they" and its derivatives in rules and plan to incorporate such gender-neutral language into my future card game when it is published.

No worries.  I can be reasoned with.  Although, I still don't like the use of 'they' for a singular noun, but I'll keep that in mind when editing other expansions in the future.  But for this case, I've decided it be better to just re-word the sentence to avoid the conflict:

When a player draws a meteor tile, that player chooses a landing position for the meteor by pointing at a tile.

Oops, I didn't mean to start any conflicts here. :-[  All of the technical documents I work with use "they" rather than "he" or "she", which is why I had suggested the replacement, however you are both correct & I'm happy to go with the new wording (or whatever the general consensus is).
Out of interest I had a look at some of the official rules & found that they don't appear to have any consistent usage: e.g. the I&C rules refer to "he" and "his", whereas the A&M rules use "his or her".

(http://www.gwommy.homestead.com/files/PurpleSmileHappy.gif)

Sorry, haven't got the time to read through the rules, but a few comments on the tiles:

1. Would it be better to have the green border surrounding the crater rim of the meteor tile so that it connects better with the neighbouring tiles?
2. The flood tile in the rules and in the tiles doesn't match?  One suggestion for the tile - show rooftops and treetops poking through the "lake" to depict flooded houses and trees - that might make the tile look better.

I like that idea a lot!  I think it would really make the tile look good.

I wouldn't think it'd be better.  Then it wouldn't line up correctly with city pieces.  I might try playing around with it to see how it looks though.

I agree.  I'll definitely work on this.

(http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/Flood.jpg) (http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/Meteor.jpg)
The flood tile I like. My attempt at greening the meteor, I don't like so much. What do you think?

==EDIT==
Updated Rules, Tiles and a ZIP file:
http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasters.pdf (http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasters.pdf)
http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasterTiles.pdf (http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasterTiles.pdf)
http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasters.zip (http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasters.zip)

Looks good. The only thing I found was under the Flood section: "If you are playing with either River I or II expansions1¹"  (the 1 should be superscript).

Fixed.
http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasters.pdf (http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasters.pdf)
http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasterTiles.pdf (http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasterTiles.pdf)
http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasters.zip (http://gwommy.tripod.com/carcassonne/NaturalDisasters.zip)

Congrats to the entire team for getting this done!

Hi gwommy, great job but I can´t see any earthquake tokens on the tiles files, are they somewhere else?

Definitively no tokens, it´s possible to edit the file on the variant page?

Oh yeah! I forgot about those. (http://gwommy.homestead.com/files/PurpleSmileEmbarrassed.gif) I'll get those added as soon as I can.

==EDIT==
Earthquake tokens added.  The above ^^^ links have been updated.

Public downloads updated.

No acknowledgement for the use of my lake design? That's somewhat disappointing.

My bad. (http://gwommy.homestead.com/files/PurpleSmileSad.gif) I'm terrible at remembering to add stuff like that in, just ask Novelty. (http://gwommy.homestead.com/files/PurpleSmileTongue.gif)

Alright, I updated the above links to include acknowledgements for tile graphics. Novelty, if you could update the public downloads with this version, that'd be great.  Thanks!