Settlers of Catan with very few building spots!

Last night, for the first time in a while, we played a four-person Settlers game with our friends Jörn and Sheila.

After our initial setup, Sheila spotted that the central 11-sheep hex was entirely inaccessible. None of us could remember seeing that kind of scenario before - but with six settlements arranged around the middle 'circle' of hexes, there were no spots at all available to be used on the central one.

I didn't think to take a photograph until we were fairly well into the game, when we realised that that, with only 18 cities or settlements, we had actually run out of building spots entirely:


Sheila, playing brown, had the longest street and so was well in the lead at this stage, with 10 points and five buildings; Richard (red) was second with 6 points; he also had managed five building spots. Jörn (blue) and I (orange) had only managed to grab four building spots each, and were tied in bottom place with five points. While it's possible to win with only four building spots, it's not easy. I prefer at least five. I did wonder whether I could get the 'largest army' but with sheep in fairly poor supply, it was difficult to buy many cards.

Strangely enough, as we upgraded our settlements as far as we could, 11s and 4s were rolled more than would be expected, and at one point I was able to 'monopolise' sheep, gaining 13 of them. With no harbours I had to trade rather heavily, but it did at least enable me to upgrade to another city and buy a further card.

I did get a victory point, and two knights.. but Jörn got in with a third knight first, and the largest army. Richard took the longest street from Sheila - and built sufficient roads that it could not be taken back - and suddenly our scores were more even: at one point we were on 9, 8, 7 and 6 points. Theoretically it could have been anyone's game, except that eventually there was nothing to do other than buy cards.

It was Sheila who won in the end, playing a fourth knight and thus taking the largest army, as well as producing two victory point cards. So she won with 13 points. Richard was second with 10, I had 9 (including my victory point), and Jörn was back to 6.

Seafarers of Catan (Fog Island scenario) for four

Jacob was out sailing with Richard and Mick. Marie wanted to play Seafarers... so we set up a four-person game. We played with our usual colours: brown for Sheila, blue for Jörn, white for Marie and orange for me. We decided on our favourite 'Fog Island' scenario, which is enjoyable to play but rather time-consuming to set up as it requires pieces from both the regular Settlers and the Seafarers boxes. There are hexes and numbers that show, and piles of them to be 'discovered' by building ships.

We opted for random placement of hexes in the main Catan island, but put the numbers according to the booklet.

There's never much room to set up initial settlements in this scenario; I always hope to sail out to discover further resource hexes. So I opted for the best numbers I could, in the circumstances. The only resources I started with were ore, wheat and clay.. which, I realised later, was a bit foolish in this game since it's wood and sheep that are needed to build ships!

Sheila was lacking clay, Marie was lacking ore, and Jörn was the only person with all five resources at the beginning. Marie was the only one of us who began with a ship rather than a street, and was thus in the best position to begin exploring first.


.. and, indeed, that's what happened. Sheila (lacking clay) and I (lacking wood) both managed a city before anything else. Jörn built a street and a settlement.. and Marie built ships, sailed away from Catan, and discovered a very useful 6-sheep hex:


I managed another city, then by dint of some trading was able, at last, to build a new settlement. Sheila started sailing out from Catan, and discovered a wood and a sheep hex. Exactly what I would have liked... but with neither wood nor sheep easily available to me, I didn't have much hope of building any ships. Nor, I realised, did I have anywhere to go since my coastal settlement was in between Marie's and Sheila's shipping lines... I would have to concentrate on building on Catan.

Marie was first to gain the longest street (or shipping route) card:


However, Sheila was just in the lead with six points. All the rest of us now had five.

That 'longest street' card changed hands several times in the game. However, Marie was also first to gain the largest army - she kept buying cards, and kept getting knights - and nobody got anywhere near challenging her on that.


At this stage, when Marie held the largest army and longest street card, she had seven points. So she was just in the lead: the rest of us each had six. It was a pretty even game, point-wise.

The longest route card went to Sheila, and then back to Marie, who was determined to keep it. The problem was that she used her resources on ships, and so didn't take the opportunity to build any settlements. I had eight points on the board - still just on the main Catan island - and Jörn had seven. Sheila also had eight points, including settlements on her discovered hexes. We also noticed that Jörn was gradually extending his streets, and might soon be able to take the longest street card himself...


However, it was Sheila who eventually took and kept the card. She had nine points on the board in buildings... and when her turn came around, she was able to build another settlement, and thus won the game with twelve points:


I was quite pleased to have eleven, since I hadn't built a single ship.

Seafarers: fog island scenario (for four)

John and Sarah have left, and Jörn was still away. Tim leaves in the early hours of tomorrow. So we decided to have one more game with Sheila while Tim's still here. She came to our house, so we played with our set. Rather than regular Settlers of Catan, we thought we'd try our favourite Seafarers scenario: fog island. It always takes awhile to set up since it needs pieces from two sets (but not all of them). We used random distribution of the resource hexes within the main Catan island, but placed the numbers according to the booklet.

Richard (red) went first. He took the 8-9-10 which is on ore, sheep and wheat. Sheep are important in Seafarers as they're needed, along with wood, to build ships.

Tim (white) was second, and - unsurprisingly - chose the 3-8-9 on clay, ore and wood. Sheila (brown) took the 4-6-9 on clay, ore and sheep which is the spot I would have chosen if I hadn't been the last to play place. While some people like being in last position, I don't particularly like it. Particularly in this game where there aren't all that many places available! So I decided I'd focus on exploring and hope for some better numbers that way. I built one of my settlements on the 6-9 with wheat and wood, and a ship rather than a street. Then I took the 5-8-12 on wood, ore and sheep. I had no clay at all, and rather feeble access to sheep, so I hoped to be able to trade for what I needed, and find some better places out at sea.


By the time the second settlements had been placed, Richard and Tim had theoretical access to all five resources, but Sheila had no wood, which was going to make it tricky to build anything.

However, 3s and 4s were rolled surprisingly often, giving Sheila a great deal of clay. So she was able to trade easily every time she wanted wood, and soon started expanding. Within a few rounds she had managed six points, including two cities. In the same time period, the rest of us each had three points...


Since I was slightly stuck by the initial position of the pirate ship, Sheila was also the first person to head out to sea.. although the first hex she turned over was another sea one:


However, she then discovered a useful sheep. And took the longest trade route too. I managed to set sail too, was pleased for a moment to see that I hadn't found a sea hex.. and then realised it was the desert. However, I then managed to uncover a wood hex, with a fairly useful 4:


So I built a settlement there, and started to explore across the land with another street, hoping to head for the gold hex. I uncovered.. yet more wood.

Sheila, meanwhile, found rather a nice ore hex (with 5), but decided to move her leading ship and then explore in the other direction, where she found a 9-wheat hex.

And Richard managed to set out to sea too:


So Sheila was well in the lead with nine points, including the longest trade route. Richard and Tim each had five, and I had four.

I was very pleased to discover an 8-sheep hex, so quickly built a settlement there, bordering two reasonably wood hexes. Sheila went back to the ore, and discovered some more. And built her remaining cities. Tim also set sail from the main Catan island:


So Sheila now had 11 points. Seafarers can be a very long game, but we'd only been playing for about an hour. She was evidently going to be the winner by a long way ... Tim had six points, Richard and I each had five.

Sure enough, Sheila was able to build one more settlement... and thus was the clear winner: