Carcassonne Central

As this might not be a rules question, I apologize in advance.  :-\

As I understand the rules, followers can be placed on tower tiles.  I can imagine strategies where it could be beneficial to risk capture when the followers might either reserve the feature (farm, city or road) or reinforce your possession of it.
However, one of the ffff tower tiles has a cloister on it.
Now I could choose to place a follower on it; but as I see it, this follower could be captured at any time prior to completing the cloister, this could take a while; so there seems to be very little (no) incentive to claim the cloister unless 1) you complete the cloister as you place the tile or 2) you desperately want other players to waste tower pieces.

My question: have I missed something or is the cloister merely a distraction?   ???

You could always claim the tower for yourself by placing a follower on top. You would need at least one tower piece before that though, so it would be a three-turn excercise all in all (1. place follower on cloister, 2. place tower piece, 3. place follower on tower). You probably wouldn't get that far... ::)

If you use P&D in addition to the tower, you could claim the cloister later (probably after the tower has been closed up) by way of a magic portal. So there are ways to use that cloister, but I agree they are not very practical/likely.

It depends on the strategy.  If all the players have used up their tower pieces, you can easily claim the cloister and not worry about it being captured.

Well, it always depends on how desperate you are to try and get some points. By desperate I mean where are you on the score board compared to the other players; how many meeple are in your (unemployed) reserve pool; how aggressively your opponents are playing this round; and how intently they are paying attention to your actions.   

Thus, consider also the "meta-game" (the personality and mood of your opponents during a particular session) ...like we don't already have enough options to think about, especially if you are using everything up to and including the Tower Expansion. 

I agree that there is little incentive to place a Monk follower onto the Cloister (we call it - Monastery),  when there is obviously a tower foundation right next to it, which will remain a constant threat throughout the game.

If it is early in the game you might want to NOT claim the Cloister, or claim it, but place it on the far edge of the board where it may be inconspicuous and forgotten about until it is close to being completed or indeed finished before anyone notices. 

Later in the game, you've got to know where you stand in the scoring.  If you are already in the lead others will want to prevent you from getting nine MORE points and will gladly capture one of your meeples to prevent it from being used elsewhere.  But if you are way behind, the other players may feel some sympathy toward you and be too involved with thwarting their closest rival to waste a tower piece on someone who doesn't currently appear to be a threat. 

After a careful risk assessment, it's just one of the chances that you've got to take.  Carcassonne is about making choices with every tile that is played and that's what keeps this game interesting, entertaining, and fun.