So we placed our initial pieces: two settlements and one city each, as per our two-player house rules.
I was reasonably pleased with my numbers: 3, 4, 5, 6, 8,9,10 with an extra 5 and 9. Richard's were also good: the same combination, but his extras were a 4 and an 8. It seemed that we were very evenly balanced. Except... which he didn't realise until we'd been playing a few rounds, Richard had no access to sheep whatsoever. He wasn't sure how that had happened, but it was a bit of a nuisance since he needed sheep to buy knights.
Moreover, although there was LOTS of wood in the game - and Richard quickly started collecting the book commodity cards to start his city expansions - there was almost no clay. So it was a bit difficult to build anything much, other than cities.
As usual we didn't introduce the barbarians or the robber until the third or fourth round. The barbarians then started their inexorable approach to Catan, while we amassed our defences. I bought a two-strength knight fairly quickly, and Richard did manage to buy a single-strength one by trading four wood. By the time the barbarians were close, we had each built an extra city, and we'd each built two streets. I'd also - eventually - managed one settlement, on the wheat harbour.
Richard was worried he would lose one of his cities since my knights were stronger; but the event die rolled colours twice, and I was able to buy another knight. I decided I'd rather gain a victory point by beating the barbarians than see Richard lose a city (and thus a point).
No 7s had yet been rolled. Nor had either of us picked up any progress cards. It looked as though it might be a long game.
By the second time the barbarians attacked Catan, I had managed to build a couple more settlements, including a useful one on the sheep harbour. Richard had bought one more street with resource cards, and had also picked up the useful street-building progress card. So he had hopes of getting access to sheep eventually. He did upgrade his knight to double-strength, and built another city. He also built a lot of city improvements - 8s were rolled frequently - meaning that he gained metropolis level rather quickly in wood/books:
My knights were stronger, so once again I gained a 'Defender of Catan' victory point. By that time I'd also picked up a victory point progress card - in Cities and Knights games they are declared at once rather than hidden - so I had a total of 11 points, which Richard had three cities including one metropolis, giving him 8 points.
By the third barbarian attack, Richard had upgraded his knight to 'mighty' status, and had also managed to build another settlement on a 3:1 harbour. I'd upgraded to another city, and also built on a 3:1 harbour, although since it was a 2-sheep hex it wasn't very useful from the resource point of view.
Since we had three knights each, and six cities, we defended Catan equally, so each picked up a progress card of our choice.
And then suddenly we were rolling better numbers, and picking up more useful resources. A 3 was rolled, giving me quite a bit of clay. And since I was the only one gaining cloth commodity cards, I also had two of the progress cards that allowed me to take, twice, two of Richard's cards of my choice (a bit like the regular Catan 'monopoly' cards, but only taking two from each player rather than all cards of that resource).
So I fortified one city, and gained metropolis level with cloth. I upgraded to my last city. I built a settlement out to the wood harbour - Richard would have liked that one as he had so much wood; but eventually he did pick up a yellow progress card, and it was the Merchant. So he placed him on wood, giving him the equivalent of the wood harbour, which was extremely useful.
Meanwhile, Richard gained another metropolis (with coins), and built a couple more settlements: one to give him sheep (should 10s or 11s be rolled) and one on the ore harbour, since he was gaining quite a bit of ore by that stage.
We both (without mentioning it aloud) happened to check each other's points around the same time. I had 12 regular building points, plus 2 for my metropolis, plus three victory point cards... giving me 17. Richard, meanwhile, had 9 regular building points, two metropolises (metropoloi?) and one point for having the merchant. 14 in all. I was quite surprised to be so far ahead, and, indeed, so close to victory since we only play to 18.
My turn came around. Could I, I wondered, possibly build two more streets and a settlement, to get my 18th point? As I pondered, a lightbulb went off in my mind. All I actually needed to do was to build the two streets, since that would give me five in a line... and thus two points for the longest street.
So that's what I did:
Meaning I won with 19 points. And it was only about 9.15pm. The entire game only took an hour and a half...
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