Hi Mark... great questions! I had the same ones, but got the straight
scoop from the Household Of 3 when I was out in DC recently.
Here's the scoop, as I understand it now.
Is the match between the house and the mirror independent of
reflection? For example:
House: <3 ^1 ^2
My Trio: ^2 ^1 >3
Nope. There is no rotational symmetry. If your House line is
alligned on a North/South vector, then all lines (which by rule
definition are parallel) must run along the same North/South
orientation. Therefore, if you read your above set up, I see a large
pointing North, a small just south of the large standing up and a
medium just south of the small, also standing up. Your trio has the
large to the south of everything, which is not the same as the house,
so it doesn't match.
Did I win? My trio, viewed from the other side of the table would
match.
Seems to me that since you play with players often around a table,
with the house in the center - this must be true, since there is no
natural "front" of the house.
There's no natural "front" but there is an orientation defined by the
House's line. Think of it in compass directions instead of left/right
and you've got it.
=== Wild Rule Question ===
When rolling a "Wild", what is the interaction between the general rule:
G: "If your trio can, you must; else you may to the house"
and the wild rule:
W: "your trio or your house"
Is it:
1) W trumps G
You pick an action, and apply it to either the trio or the house.
You may choose to apply it to the house even if the action you picked
could be applied to your trio.
This is the right interpretation. Wild trumps general rule. You pick
an action AND you choose where to play it.
As an odd "fer instance," If you roll a swap, you will always be able
to apply that to your own trio - it's only with a Wild that you can
use Swap on the House.
Remember also that the "no passing" rule gets a bit weird here. If
you can do something on your own trio, youv'e got to do that, even if
you've rolled a wild. The only way you can pass is (a) you roll a
wild (b) you pick an action that you CAN'T do on your Tree but you
can do on the House and (c) you choose not to do that action on the
House. If you pick something that you can't do on either, then you
roll again. If you pick something that you can do to your Tree and
the House, you can pick which one you do it on.
P.S.: Was the ascii-art treehouse notation clear?
< = left leaning 3 = large piece
^ = upright 2 = medium piece
> = right leaning 1 = small piece
stacks are listed top to bottom
Ex.: Initial House: <3 ^1 >2
Initial Tree: ^1,2,3
A Nest: ^3,2,1
Yeah! This was great! Totally understandable, especially now that I
see how you're notating Trees and Nests. Cool!!
Hope this helped!
-Carol
(she who is talking retailers through these rules on a regular basis
over the phone - and who would LOVE to have more people go into stores
to explain these rules to retailers!!!)