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.
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