Settlers of Catan for six

John and Sarah are only here together for a week, and the last available time to play Settlers with them at Jörn and Sheila's was yesterday. We had an enjoyable meal there, then the children - most of them - went to bed, and we got the game out. I was pretty tired after a few late nights recently and hoped John or Sarah might win.

As we chatted while getting ready to play, Richard built another construction with his pieces...


When we set up our initial settlements and streets, I was the last - something that doesn't happen very often - so in the useful position of placing both settlements together. I didn't really look at the board until my turn, other than to note that all the obvious 'good' spots had been taken. Unsurprisingly.

When I studied it, I realised immediately that ore was likely to be in short supply, other than from the 6 hex. Clay was too - perhaps even more so - but the best clay hex was a 5, and the available spots weren't particularly useful. So I decided to opt for the 'ore-wheat' strategy - ie concentrating on building cities at first, and then trading for other resources. There was a useful spread of numbers (6, 9, 10) with two wheat and an ore; I was slightly surprised nobody else had taken it. So that was an easy choice.

I then pondered, considering a couple of coastal spots that would have given me two new numbers. But decided that, since I would need to do a lot of trading - there was no way I could get clay and wood reliably - I'd go for an intersection with three sheep hexes that should enable me to build on one of the sheep harbours. A risky move if I were aiming to win, but I thought it might be fun to try something a little different. There was only one new number (8).

So I started the game with only four numbers, and only three resources.


Indeed, we were mostly lacking at least one resource. Richard (red), who played first, and had a good range of numbers, had no clay or sheep. Sarah (white) had no wheat. John (green) had no sheep, though he had potentially very good wood and clay. Jörn (blue) had no ore, and not very good access to wheat. Sheila (brown) was the only person with access to all five resources at the start of the game.

We got going fairly quickly, with a surprising number of 5s and 11s being rolled (neither of which gave me anything). John built plenty of streets and did some useful trading; Jörn also expanded fairly rapidly, and I built a couple of cities before going anywhere with streets. I then managed to trade sufficiently to build out to the sheep harbour - very useful - and the ore harbour, although I didn't use that one nearly so much.


John took the longest street card early in the game, and although it was taken from him at one point, he then kept it by building so many roads that nobody could possibly catch up.

My problem - as I knew would be the case - was that I had a hard time expanding, even with my harbours. I did gain some clay from a couple of unexpected 3s, and was fairly easily able to trade for wood. Even so, I couldn't trade between turns, so kept buying cards when I had more than 7 cards in my hand (since I did, at least, have the resources for development cards). I possibly needn't have worried - as far as I recall, only two or three 7s were rolled in the entire game. On the other hand, I did gain a victory point.

By the time I had my four cities, other people with better access to clay and wood had expanded into my last remaining building spots, so the only thing left for me to do was to buy cards. I also started playing knights, realising I could probably gain the largest army card since very few other cards were being bought - ore was too rare a resource for almost everyone else - and I knew I was likely to pick up more knights. As was the case... by the final round (when I'd played two of them) I had in my development cards two victory points and about eight knights. Nothing else at all - no monopolies or years of plenty or street-building.

It got to John's turn. He had 11 points on the board (including the longest street, which was secured to him by then). I hoped he'd be able to build another settlement or city and win. But although he had the cards for a settlement, he couldn't also manage another street which he needed first. Since John had been in the lead for most of the game, I'd been moving the knight mostly onto his hexes... just because that's what one does.

If other people had played knights or rolled 7s, they should probably have targetted me, since by that stage it was clear that I was going to get the largest army, and its attached two points. But on the board, I had only my four cities; I'd only built six streets, one of which was wasted (but played to reduce my hand to seven at a stage when I did happen to have wood and clay). It didn't seem that I would be any threat to John. And I really would have liked it better if he'd won...

After John's turn, I bought another development card since I once again had too many in my hand. It was another victory point. So when my turn came around, I played my third knight and showed my victory points. I suppose I could have NOT played the knight, and let it go on for another round to see if John could have won but it didn't seem right somehow. Winning because someone else 'lets' you isn't a real win at all.


So I won with 13 points, and John was second with 11.

It was a good game, and we'd finished before 10pm for once.

Settlers of catan with five of us

Jörn and Sheila's older children like to play Settlers, and often ask if they can stay up for a game... so yesterday afternoon Sarah and I volunteered to go and play a game with them. Sheila played with Lukas, who is 8 and a little erratic in his play, so it was a five-person game. I played orange, Marie (12) was white, Jacob (10 and highly competitive) was green, Lukas/Sheila red, and Sarah brown.

I forgot to take a picture right after the initial placement, but here's what it looked like after a couple of moves - all that had happened on the board was that Jacob had built a street.


As can probably seen from the layout of the board, and the numbers, ore was not a shortage in this game. Moreoever, 5s were rolled with surprising regularity. That meant that I was able to build two cities fairly early on in the game, and Jacob managed to build all four of his within about half an hour:


.. although by that time Marie had (temporarily) taken the longest street card.

Of course, four cities placed like that meant that Jacob kept gaining even more ore. And since 10s were also rolled fairly often, he had a lot of wheat, too. We didn't realise quite how much until his turn came around, and he heaved a great sigh of relief that he had not rolled a 7. He had - among other things - the cards for TWO cities (and almost a third) in his hand!


- but they were of no use to him directly, nor could he play them at the end of anyone else's turn, since he had no cities left to build.

He was able to trade for a good amount of clay and wood, and decided to ensure that he got - and kept - the longest street card, by building all 15 of his streets continuously. If he hadn't done that, Marie might have overtaken him again. The disadvantage of that was that he limited his building spots: he only had one more. He managed to build a settlement there, and was then stuck with buying cards; since he had 11 points by then, none of us really wanted to trade with him, so he sometimes had to trade four ore or wheat with the bank for one sheep card.

Meanwhile I had 9 points on the board, and had bought two victory point development cards. Sheila and Lukas (by this stage it was mostly Sheila playing) also had 9 points on the board. I wasn't picking up many cards at all, and thought Jacob would surely get a victory point card... he was buying two or three cards each turn. But he played, and didn't declare 12 points... so Marie played, then it was Sheila's turn. She managed to build a settlement AND a city, giving her two more points... and then showed a victory point card. So she and Lukas were the winners....

.. or so we thought. Jacob then revealed that he did in fact have a victory point card, so he also had 12 points. When we asked, bewildered, why he didn't declare it (so as to be the outright winnner) he said he was hoping for 15 points. He wanted the largest army (and could have achieved it the following round) and thought that if he kept playing he might pick up yet another victory point card. He wasn't worried about sharing his win with Sheila and Lukas; the important thing was that he beat me!

I forgot to take the final photograph until Marie had already removed her white pieces. But she did it tidily enough that everything else was showing:

Seafarers of Catan: fog Island (random numbers) for four

Last night we had John and Sarah for a meal, and decided to play a round of Seafarers of Catan. Sarah had never played before; John had only played once, when we taught our other friends with the lengthy five-person Seafarers game last week. We decided to do our favourite 'Fog Island' again, as it's the easiest way to explain how the Seafarers rules work.

We set up the random version of the main island, with both resources and numbers, which was quicker than following the booklet instructions. It didn't take too long to make our initial choices of settlement placements:


There weren't any obviously brilliant places, and since the resources were rather clumped together, we all opted for a range of numbers rather than trying to get access to all the resources. As someone observed, there were only three intersections which gave access to three different resources - and one of those was unreachable due to another placement.

I did waver between the 8-9 intersection on the coast with sheep and grain, for my second placement, or the 6-10 on a different coastline giving two grain - which would also have slightly annoyed Richard who hoped for that harbour. I decided that the 8-9 was better: the numbers were slightly better, and it gave me two different resources.

I had cause to regret that decision somewhat during the game!

John and Sarah both started building boats as soon as they could, so as to explore the 'fog island' spaces, and John quickly gained the longest trade route card:


He didn't expect to keep it... however, he really liked the exploration part of the game, so he kept building ships and turning over tiles, and soon had such a long trade route that nobody was likely to overtake him:


By that stage Richard had started sailing out to explore too, and I built a couple of boats since that's how this game works... but John had already explored most of the territory near my ships, so I might have done better to expand on the main island and forget about ships.


However, I decided I might as well build settlements on some of the land hexes John had uncovered since the numbers were rather better than anything I could do elsewhere - and it was easier for me to build ships anyway as I had no access to clay other than by trading.


John was in the lead for some time, and built settlements on some excellent locations. However he wasn't getting much access to wheat, so it was very difficult for him to build cities. For some time he had five settlements and the longest street, then he managed to build a couple of cities, meaning he could extend yet further - to make sure that Sarah's increasing trade route didn't overtake his - but it was slow going for him to attempt to get to 12 points.

Meanwhile Sarah was building wherever she could... and when she got to 11 points on the board she revealed one victory point development card which she'd bought early in the game, and was declared the winner:


So John came second with 10 points, while Richard and I both had 9. So, a good ending with all of us fairly even in points - anyone could have won. Very few development cards were bought and only a couple of knights played, so nobody claimed the largest army.

Settlers of Catan for six players

It's a while since we've played Settlers of Catan with six people. Jörn and Sheila had their set back, but we took ours anyway and ended up using their main pieces, but our sea grids to make it more stable. We spend as much time chatting as playing, so although we got there by about 8.20, it was 9pm by the time we'd set it up and then made our initial placements.


I was orange, as usual; Richard red; Jörn blue; Sheila brown; John green; Sarah white. Sarah placed first (and last); I was in fifth position which is better than fourth, but not as good as first or last! On my first placement, I opted for what might be called a 'courageous' move... an intersection with three grain hexes, but close to the grain harbour. On my second, I was able to access wood and ore, and - on a 12 - clay, but I had no access to sheep at all. At least I picked up resources for a street in my initial cards and was able to play that almost immediately. I then had to trade extensively until I could build a settlement on the grain harbour,

The game got going fairly evenly, with a fair number of resources being picked up, and nobody obviously in the lead. After my hard-won settlement, I built two cities quite easily. I suppose I was playing the 'ore-grain' strategy as described elsewhere, although I hadn't really thought about it. Sheila and John also built cities early in the game, although the others found it harder to do so. But still, it was fairly even for the first half hour or so.


Sheila and I were slightly ahead, so for a while we were the targets of the robber.

John then extended out, to grab what building spaces he could - and access to some more numbers - and took the longest street card:


That put him in the lead, and made him the target of the robber for most of the rest of the game, although I still had my share of being targetted.

Jörn and Richard ran out of building spaces fairly quickly, so had to concentrate on buying cards and - where possible - building cities. Richard got the largest army by collecting several knights, while Sheila and I extended into the rather barren regions beyond the desert. John extended his street to ensure nobody else could take it...


I bought my first development card - and it was a monopoly. I was planning to monopolise grain, since there was quite a lot in the game and I had the grain harbour. I wasn't entirely sure what I'd do with it, since that depended on how many I gained.

Sheila extended further. We reached the stage where John 11 points. Sheila, Jörn and I all had 9. Sarah had 7, Richard had 6. Evidently John was going to win soon...

Then a 5 was rolled on the turn before mine. So Jörn picked up four wood cards. I had five clay cards in my hand, since I'd traded for one, and then a 12 had been rolled. Suddenly I realised that if I could build another five streets, I could take the longest street card from John, and perhaps extend the game a little. I wasn't sure I wanted to - it was getting late, and I was tired. And I wanted John to win, since he hasn't done so with us. It was an inward struggle. But, like having a seven-letter word in Scrabble, or a brilliant place to put the Z, it felt wrong NOT to do it once I realised that I could.

If I'd rolled a 7, I'd have had to lose a lot of cards and wouldn't necessarily have done it so quickly.

But I didn't.

So I called a monopoly on wood, and collected about six wood cards. With the handful of grain I was holding, and the clay cards, I could then build all the extra streets I needed:


John was not impressed. I felt bad until I remembered that he'd attacked my streets in previous games. And it IS just a game...

We played about three more moves. I managed to collect all I needed to build a settlement - so, the game didn't extend that much longer, and I won:


I was lucky with that monopoly card. I was lucky that I didn't roll a 7. I was lucky that a 12 was rolled when I had two cities on a 12-clay hex. John should really have won...

Cities and Knights game for two again

After playing a long five-person Seafarers game last Sunday, and a very enjoyable Settlers game on Tuesday, we decided to have a two-person Cities and Knights game yesterday evening. The board looked very small after playing the two extensions earlier in the week, and it took us a moment to remember the variations necessary for a two-player game!

I placed my first settlement on what looked like a useful intersection with ore, wood and sheep (which give commodity cards when the settlement is upgraded to a city), and two good numbers: 5, 6 and 11. Richard then placed his two settlements so as to get all five resources, and a fair selection of numbers. I then put my second settlement and city using similar strategy, although I was lacking the 8 and the 4. I placed my city on an intersection with two wood and sheep, which would give me the cloth and book commodities, since I like the relevant cards much better than those associated with coins (which come from ore). Richard then placed his city in the place I'd considered... giving him two ore hexes next to his initial city.


So we played for twenty minutes or so, during which time Richard did indeed gain a lot of coin commodity cards, and was able to build city improvements using them right up to metropolis level surprisingly fast. He also gained victory cards for the first two barbarian attacks. I wasn't too happy about that; I'd bought a two-ring knight fairly early in the game and activiated it, and Richard also had an active two-ring knight. We had four cities in all by the first attack, so should have received one card of our choice each. However... one of the 'coin' related cards Richard had collected was the 'deserter' card which enabled him to remove my knight and have a free knight himself of the same status. Thereafter, although I did buy another knight, I was never able to catch him up. However I managed the longest street card, and kept hold of that, which was something.


By the third barbarian attack, we hadn't been counting our cities carefully enough... and the barbarians won! Since Richard had the stronger knight force, I had to give up one of my cities and return it to a settlement.


I did manage to gain the metropolis using the book commodity cards, which gave me an extra two points, and I did have control of the merchant for almost the entire game, which was useful. Particularly when I also picked up the card enabling me to have six free wheat cards (since I had settlements bordering three wheat hexes) and could thus build a settlement using seven wheat (since the merchant was on wheat).

It was quite close near the end. I had worked out that Richard had 17 points: 12 in buildings, 2 for his metropolis, and three 'defender of Catan' cards. I had 16: 10 in buildings, 2 for my metropolis, 2 for the longest street, one for the merchant, and one for a victory point progress card which I had picked up. I had also worked out that, by careful trading, I could manage the commodity cards necessary to take the final metropolis - so long as Richard didn't - and win by a breadth.

He was also working out whether he could take that metropolis, but realised that he couldn't. However, when I pointed out that he only needed one more point to win, he built his final settlement, taking him to 18 points.

Settlers of Catan for five

After our lengthy - and tiring - Seafarers game for five on Sunday, we decided on our next games night for five to play the basic Settlers of Catan (with the 5-6 player expansion, of course). Jörn and Sheila's set is out on loan, so we took our 'new' version with the outer sea grid.

Setup was rather quicker, and although it took us a while to get through our initial placement of settlements and streets, the game got going by about 9pm. Here's how we set up our starting positions:


I (with orange pieces) was fourth to place; I realised that if I wanted a variety of numbers, I would have to sacrifice one resource. Since wood was likely to be plentiful in this game, I hoped I would be able to trade for it.

The game started well with some useful rolls of the dice meaning that we were all picking up a reasonable selection of cards. I was indeed able to trade for wood, and soon built my three other settlements and some streets. My problem was gaining any ore. It wasn't so plentiful, and I picked up almost none.

John (green) claimed the longest street card fairly early on; I decided I might as well see if I could take it from him, and built a few more streets to do so. He began building towards me, hoping to break into it and divide it into two: a risky strategy, since it used up roads without giving him any new building spaces.


I was in the lead by that stage, by a couple of points, so the robber was placed on one of my hexes. Almost continually! I did pick up one knight card to move it, but the lack of ore meant it was difficult to pick up any other development cards - and besides, I needed to keep my ore in the hope of building some cities.

Although several 7s were rolled, there were very few on turns when anyone had more than 7 cards. Jörn was pleased when his turn came up, and he didn't roll a 7, since he had a vast handful of cards that couldn't be played on anyone else's turn:


Richard (red pieces) realised that he was in the running for the longest street, if he built quickly; so I extended mine, despite it not being very efficient from the building space point of view. At least I had an entire section of coastline to build along. I was quite prepared for Richard to take the street from me, then Jörn (blue pieces) grabbed his last building spot which happened to be in the middle of Richard's street, breaking it up and ensuring that nobody else could take the longest street card from me.

Right through the game, the points were surprisingly close. Both John and Jörn ran out of building spaces, so John kept buying development cards and quickly gained the Largest Army card. By about 10.30 we'd reached the stage where three of us (Jörn, Sheila and I) all had 10 points, Richard had 9 points, and John had 8 points. All three of the guys also had at least two unrevealed development cards, so we knew there was a high chance that at least some of them were extra victory points.


It really was a very good game. I thought that Jörn would probably win; if he had a victory point card, he was only one point away from 12.

Then Richard had his turn. An 11 had just been rolled, giving me two valuable ore cards. I hoped I might manage to build a city on my turn, directly after his. Alas for my hopes. He played a monopoly card and took all the ore in the game - about five or six cards in all. He had plenty of wheat, so was able to turn two of his settlements into cities. And since he had a hidden victory point card, he went from 9 to 12 in one move, and won the game.


We all agreed it was a very good game, which could have been won by any of us. Jörn and John did each have a victory point card, and Sheila had built another city on the turn before Richard played his monopoly... so the final scores were very close indeed: 12 to Richard, 11 each to Jörn and Sheila, 10 to me, and 9 to John.

Seafarers: Fog Island for five players

Our Settlers-playing friends arrived back after six weeks away, and a guest who also plays is in our downstairs flat. So on Sunday we arranged a game! Richard opted for Seafarers of Catan and we decided to set up Fog Island, with - for the first time - the Seafarers 5-6 person expansion. It took about 20 minutes to set up...


I really did not want to win. I was tired, and had a low-key migraine; dulled with painkillers, but sufficient to make me unable to concentrate hard. I didn't even remember my camera, so Richard had to take photos using his phone.

I was the last person to place my first settlement, so got to do two at once, but by that stage most of the good spots were gone. Not that any of them were obviously brilliant. Setting up according to the booklet meant the board was fairly balanced.


I suppose I was lucky. In the early part of the game I was able to buy quite a few cards, and also built a couple of cities fairly earl on. I set out to sea fairly soon, and quickly gained the 'longest trade route' points. Jörn (playing blue) was not so lucky; he hardly seemed to pick up any cards at all. Play in general was pretty slow. Richard (red) and Sheila (brown) also managed to sail out to do some exploring, but none of us built all that many settlements or cities.


It's interesting having another person, used to playing with different people. John (with green pieces) tends to think somewhat outside the box, and will also sometimes play more aggressively. In this game, realising that I was some way in the lead, he started sailing ships out towards me - not intending to explore, or even build anything useful, but in the hope of placing a settlement in the middle of my 'longest trade route', thus reducing it significantly and meaning the card would pass to Richard or Sheila.


I managed to foil that one, once I realised what he was doing, by building a settlement there myself - although it wasn't a spot I would have chosen. John then moved his ships to a different point in my 'route', and I started building streets at the other end to ensure it stayed the longest.

I had the 'largest army' card at one point too, but Richard was able to take it from me when I had 11 points, putting me back at 9.

It's possible that Richard or Sheila might have been able to take the longest route from me, even so. And since I really didn't want to win, I wouldn't have minded... except that, by that point, it was 11pm. We'd been playing for nearly two and a half hours and it wasn't just me who was yawning and feeling bleary-eyed. So I put all my effort into building, and was able to get a last settlement, taking me to 9 points in buildings, 2 for the longest trade route, and one extra Victory Point card.


It wasn't a very even game - Sheila was the only other person who managed to build even one city. She came second with 8 points (including one card); Richard had 7 (including the largest army); John had 5, and Jörn had 4. I'm not quite sure why it was so uneven - none of the starting places were that bad. I suppose it was just the roll of the dice.

Seafarers: Wonders of Catan

It was 8.20pm, so we had plenty of time. But didn't want anything too mentally tiring. So we thought we'd try out the final set scenario for Seafarers of Catan. It looked rather complicated, but Seafarers games don't tend to be as complex as Cities and Knights.

The first thing we had to do was prepare the 'wonder' cards. We have no idea why they were not put on cards by the manufacturers; instead they were printed in the instruction booklet, with nothing on the back. Richard wanted to do it properly, so he pasted them onto card, and cut them with a craft knife. There were five different 'wonders of Catan'. Each player can choose one to build when they've gained whatever is the requirement given, and can then build at four different levels, with the resources shown on the card. Here are three of them:


This sounded rather like the city improvements in Cities and Knights, at a simpler level. So we thought we could deal with that one.

The board was quite a big one; we set it out exactly as given in the booklet. By the time we were actually ready to play, it was 8.45! The setup alone had taken half an hour.

The game didn't sound too complicated after all when we read the instructions. We had to start on the main island, we would gain one Catan chit (and one victory point) if we managed to build on a foreign island; so that was familiar. The pirate ship doesn't come into play at all. The only extra bit is building the 'wonders' - and apparently whoever first completes four levels of a 'wonder' is the winner.

So we made our initial placements, not really sure what would be the best ones since the various wonders require different sets of resource cards. Richard took the better places, overall, with a wider variety of numbers.


I concentrated, as I usually do, on expanding - building settlements and cities, and buying development cards. Richard managed to build a couple of cities very quickly, and then set out to sea. His first couple of development cards were useful ones - year of plenty, and street-building, and he was gaining rather more resources than I was, due to his better selection of numbers.


I soon found I had the longest 'trade route' so took the longest street card. Richard, however, decided to start the monument 'wonder' card since he was collecting vast amounts of wheat but had no way to get to the wheat harbour.

Within about five turns, he had bought his way right to the last level... which theoretically meant he was the winner. It was too easy. So we decided that in the two-player version of this game, we'd each have to build two 'wonders' of Catan rather than just one. So he started a second.


I hadn't really got into the wonders at all, but adopted a couple of them anyway and managed to get to the first level of each. It was really much easier than city improvements in 'Cities and Knights', but seemed a little pointless too. And didn't seem to count for any victory points.

It wasn't long before Richard got to the fourth level on his second wonder - so it was clearly time to stop the game and declare him the winner.


Except that... by that stage I had the largest army card as well as the longest street; I had 11 points in buildings, and one point for having explored a foreign island. And a victory point development card - 17 in all. Richard had only 9 points in buildings, plus the extra for building on a foreign island. It seemed wrong, somehow, that he was nonetheless the winner.


Perhaps, we thought, we should also allocate a couple of points to to each finished 'wonder'. That would give him an extra four points... taking his total to 14. That still didn't work. So then we decided we would allocate one point for each level of each 'wonder'. That gave Richard 8 more points, taking his total to 18. Except that... I had built the first level of each of my 'wonders'. So in that system, I would get a couple of extra points too, taking me to 19, and still ahead.

Oh well. We keep track of scores on a sheet, so we simply declared Richard the winner with 18 points, and me the loser with 19. I thought he deserved to win as he had the better starting positions.

All in all, though, we weren't too impressed with this particular scenario.

Cities and Knights game for two

It was only 8pm, so we decided to play another round of Cities and Knights. I still find it a lot more mentally tiring than other variations of Settlers of Catan, but Richard likes it best and it's certainly an interesting game.

Initial set-up strategy is a little different from the other games. Wheat is vital, so as to enable knights to be active - I did remember that much. But it's also important to ensure that cities can be built (and preferably the one initial city) on intersections with wood, sheep and ore hexes, so as to gain the commodity cards that enable city improvements. Richard usually does better than me with that - and since he got to start, he was able to take what was clearly the best place from that point of view. I concentrated primarily on wheat.


After the first three rounds, we started rolling the event die as well as the two number dice, and the barbarians advanced rapidly. Indeed, there were so many barbarian faces rolled that they got to Catan before we had anything like enough active knights.


So nobody gained a victory point as 'defender of Catan', and I lost one of my cities: demoted to a settlement. Ah well.

Play proceeded fairly rapidly, with not much building being done. I was pleased to pick up the merchant card, and placed it on a sheep hex since I had a lot of sheep and the two-to-one trading was useful in buying another settlement.

I did also manage to buy another knight, and had high hopes of being defender of Catan... but alas, Richard picked up one of those most unpleasant 'deserter' cards, meaning that he got to place a knight at no cost, in place of one of mine. From that point onwards, he had continually more knights in the game than I did, although I never again lost a city.

The second time the barbarians attacked, Richard gained a victory point as 'defender of Catan'.


Tessie, who's determined that Richard is her current person, insisted on sitting on him while we played. That was fine at the beginning, when she was asleep, but she suddenly decided that dice would make rather interesting toys:


I think the barbarians must have been a little scared of Tessie, as are most of the neighbourhood cats, since the next few rounds gave us fewer of the barbarian rolls, and more of the coloured faces, enabling us to pick up more progress cards and also to expand our buildings. I realised I was only likely to gain one metropolis, so I went all out for that, and also took the longest street card. Richard managed a metropolis too, shortly afterwards. He also got control of the merchant, which deducted a victory point from me and gave an extra one to him.

I forgot to take a photo of the next barbarian attack - but once again Richard gained a victory point. Earlier in the game I had been ahead on points, but now he had clearly taken the lead.

Before long the final barbarian attack took place:


I had 13 points on the board (including my metropolis) and the longest street card, giving me 15. Richard had 12 points in buildings, including his metropolis, one point for the merchant, three 'defender of Catan' cards, and one victory point card which he'd picked up as a progress card. 17 in all, and we play to 18.

I don't think he'd realised how close he was, however; so after we'd dealt with the barbarian attack and de-activated the knights, he built two streets (with one of the useful street-building cards) and a settlement. So he had 18 points, and was the winner:


It seemed very abrupt; if I hadn't counted up we wouldn't have realised. It was tempting, for a moment, to continue... but we remembered that this game tends to get tedious after 18 points, and that it's definitely the time to stop.

So Richard was clearly the winner this time.

Seafarers of Catan: fog Island (random numbers)

I was very tired last night, having woken for some reason at 4.30am. So we thought we'd play a game that didn't require too much brain-power but which we enjoyed. So we opted for Seafarers: Fog Island once more, using the random hex and number setup for the main island.

I went first, but really wasn't awake enough to think of strategy. So I just opted for what looked like the best intersection number-wise, and on my final two placements went for a variety of numbers and resources. I thought I should get a fair amount of wheat, with 5, 9 and 10, and planned on the wheat harbour. That was about as far as I got.


Tessie decided she would join in. We did manage to persuade her not to get on the table....


As often seems to happen in this game, Richard set out to sea to explore uncharted territory earlier than I did. I didn't get nearly as much wheat as I'd expected, but did collect rather a lot of ore. Unfortunately the ore harbour was beyond my reach. It did mean I built some cities very early in the game; in fact I'd built them all before I managed to reach the coast and start building boats.


Richard found himself - unusually - buying a lot of cards. He quickly gained the largest army - and carried on playing knights regularly. He also gained the longest street (trade route) card fairly easily with his exploring ships.

I wasn't really thinking about winning.. I just kept exploring and/or building, using whatever resources became available. However, since we were playing our standard two-player rule that the person with lower points controls the robber when a 7 is rolled, we did have to stop and count every so often. Then it occurred to me - a turn after the event - that my 'trade route' was actually longer than Richard's. It was his turn, and he'd just placed a road that made his route 11 pieces long. I realised that mine was already 11.. which meant that I should have taken the 'longest street' card, and that he would need 12 piece to overtake.

The following turn he rolled a 7. We counted points to see who was ahead. Up to that point, it had been Richard every time. But he only had 10 points on the board, whereas I had 12. He had the largest army, but I had the longest street. So I had 14 points. I hadn't realised that.... and I also held two victory point development cards. So I showed them... that gave me 16 points, and I was the winner.


Except that... it was still Richard's turn. I should have realised that when it was my turn. I shouldn't have declared it out of turn. So on his turn, he moved his leading ship to the coastline behind the main island, and built another ship... which meant he now had the longest trade route, and took the longest street card back. Now I had just my 12 on the board (plus the two victory point cards, which I hid again) while he had 10 on the board, plus for four the army and street. And a victory point card which he showed at the same time as I showed mine, giving him 15...


So he was bound to win.... I really wanted him to win, too. And I also wanted to see if I could built my final settlement on the gold hex which would give me a resource of my choice if an 11 was rolled. I don't think I've built next to a gold hex before. So I said that now neither of us had 16 points yet, we should continue playing.

I put all my energies into building further streets so as to gain the gold hex. And succeeded :-)


Having done so, I then proceeded to roll an 11 on my next move!


And then... I built yet more ships, so I was able to take back the longest street card once more. Meaning that, instead of Richard winning as expected, I won with 17 points since I now had all 13 points' worth of buildings on the board.


It was a good game, anyway.