Chapter 3 of 4

Once again, some time has passed. Our scene unfolds in the reception hall of the Prince’s City Palace. “Did we finally get rid of that Bera, Chancellor? Or is she still instigating the people against me? By the Gods! After two Insurrections, half of the city has been reduced to rubble. This needs to end!“
“It has ended, Your Highness,” the Chancellor replied. “Shortly before our guards could catch her, Bera finally returned to the circle of the Princess’s court ladies.“
The Chancellor fervently hoped that the Prince would not ask him how much this had cost the state coffers.
“Good. But even so, things must change, Chancellor. The people ought to venerate me. The large Relief I recently bestowed upon my subjects in memory of the glorious past of my ancestors doesn’t seem to impress them much. We need something that makes them look up to me. We need a monument with an impressive bronze statue of me. A powerful, martial monument that would even impress the Princess’s own heroes.“

“Good idea, Your Highness,” replied the Chancellor. “However, the princely coffers are empty. How can we …“
“Whaaat!?“ the Prince screamed. “Do you have no imagination? Clearly, you do not. The magic word for filled coffers is Taxation! Don’t you know that?“
The Chancellor cleared his throat. “But Your Highness,“ he said intimidated, “that would already be the fourth special tax of this year …“
“So what? People will be proud to make sacrifices for a magnificent monument of their Prince. Get hold of a Traveling Theater if you like. Aren’t there still some actors in the dungeon? Have them put on some funny play. That will raise the people’s spirits. And distribute bread for free.“

At the same time, in the Princess’s ballroom:

“Thank you for your loyal services, Bera. It seems you gave the Prince a terrible time.“
“It wasn’t difficult, Princess,” replied Bera. “The Prince treats his people badly, and my words fell on fertile ground. Besides, I liked to contribute to building the Aqueduct.“
“Yes, finally all citizens have fresh and clean water. People are healthier and more joyful at their work. The production of fields and pastures increases noticeably and provides me with the means to build a Hospital soon.“

“The populace loves you for your deeds, Princess – also in the Prince’s land, where more and more people manage to get across the strongly guarded border, to settle in our principality. The numbers are rising since you have started Feeding the Poor regularly.“

“Everyone is welcome. There is still a lot of room for settlers in my principality.“

This is the end of the third chapter of part 12. Next week, in the last chapter, I will present the last seven cards of the new Theme Set “The Era of Prosperity.”
“The Era of Prosperity” is the first of three new Theme Sets of the “Age of Enlightenment” expansion for “The Rivals for Catan.”

Klaus Teuber

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Chapter 2 of 4

A few months later, in the Prince’s reception room:
His face pinched with grief, the Chancellor entered and bowed to the Prince.
“Why so glum?” the Prince grunted. “Have the peasants skipped their dues, because their brats are wasting time in school instead of helping with the harvest?”
“Worse, my Prince. The Brigands have struck again and robbed a shipment of wool and gold that was meant for you.”
The Chancellor ducked the princely slipper flying towards him as well as the furious rant that simultaneously rained down on him.
“What’s gotten into you, Chancellor! Confronting me with such ghastly news before my afternoon nap, that’s outrageous! And what do you intend to do about that riffraff?” “We could hire Mercenaries, your Highness, to secure the roads.”
“Mercenaries, I see! If they offer their services for free, then I’m all for it.”
“Probably not for free, but we could send the thieves who are now in the dungeon to the Princess’s realm and use the stolen goods in the Thieves’ Hideout to pay the Mercenaries.”
“Good proposal, Chancellor. Killing two birds with one stone. The Princess’s success and popularity are a thorn in my side anyway.”

In the neighboring principality, the Princess was walking through the streets of her city, accompanied by a small entourage. At a plaza, she encountered some children standing around a well with empty buckets in their hands – they were all weeping.
“Why are you crying, children?“ she asked.
One girl valiantly stepped forward, made an awkward curtsey, and replied. “The well is empty, Your Highness, and in all other wells of the city, the water is bad and makes us sick. If we come back with empty buckets, our parents will be very angry again.“

“There is no clean water?” The Princess gave her sister a horrified look. “Why does nobody tell me these things? Somebody has to do something about it!”
“Dear Princess, I didn’t want to bother you with that,” her sister replied. “Only an Aqueduct that carries fresh water from the mountains to the city could help. But building one is too expensive. We cannot afford it.”
“Yes, we can!” With a forceful movement of her hand, the Princess seemed to brush aside her sister’s concerns.
“There are many craftspeople here that are looking for work. We’ll construct a Builders’ Hut, gather them there, and provide them with the tools and building materials needed.”
“Dear princess sister, that still leaves the financing problem unresolved, particularly since a mysterious band of thieves has been stealing resources from us lately.“
“The Prince sent them after us, that obnoxious fellow. But we’ll turn the tables on him and send Bera the Insurrectionist after him. That will increase his unpopularity, until he is ready to help us out with resources for our Aqueduct in return for Bera’s
withdrawal.”

“The Era of Prosperity” is the first of three new Theme Sets of the “Age of Enlightenment” expansion for “The Rivals for Catan.”

Klaus Teuber

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Chapter 1 of 4

In the fictitious history of Catan, the Era of Barbarians is followed by the Era of Prosperity. The barbarians have been defeated, and Catan has defended its independence. The returning prosperity improves the Catanians’ living conditions and allows the arts – influenced by the European Renaissance – to flourish on Catan. This has a positive effect on the contentment of the citizens.

In the game, the citizens’ contentment is represented by the “Public Feeling” marker card. The blue stars symbolize contentment points. A player can earn or lose contentment points by means of certain actions – in each case, the card is rotated in the corresponding direction.
Being in the role of princes or princesses, it is in our – the players’ – hands whether our people are content or whether the next insurrection is just around the corner … Let’s see how our nameless Prince deals with his new possibilities:

“Good morning, Your Princely Highness. Congratulations to your inauguration! You rested well, I hope?”
“No, not at all, Chancellor! Almost all night long I asked myself the nagging question of how to replenish my empty coffers.”
“Your Highness should build schools.”
“Schools? Those country bumpkins are supposed to drudge, not laze around!”
“Of course, Your Highness. But please consider that he who is literate and numerate will be more successful as a craftsman or merchant. And he who is more successful is more content and can pay higher taxes and thus will fill your princely coffers faster.
“Good point, Chancellor. Well then, let schools be built. But those yokels have to learn fast. I can’t wait forever to get my money.”

At the same time, in the Princess’s chamber:
“Good morning, Princess. I hope you had a good night?”
“No, unfortunately not, dear sister. I had to think incessantly of the poor in my principality. There are so many who have no land to cultivate grain or at least sustain a skinny cow on a pasture.”
“Maybe you should establish common property. That is, land that every inhabitant of a village can use. In old Europe, which I recently visited, they call it Common Land.”
“That’s a good idea, dear sister. I will immediately decree that parts of my princely property be designated as common property.”

“You won’t regret it. With Common Land in the future, not only will your people be better off, there will also be fewer resource shortages.”
“Yes, those shortages are really a pain in the neck. In one area the granaries are filled to the brim, while in another area people don’t have a single brick for building.”
“So why don’t you also give your people places where they can meet to trade?”
“You mean, I should establish a Small Market Town between larger market towns?”
“Yes, then people won’t have to travel too far in order to use their abundance in one resource to balance their shortage in another.”

“The Era of Prosperity” is the first of three new Theme Sets of the “Age of Enlightenment” expansion for “The Rivals for Catan.”

Klaus Teuber

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In the context of its fictitious history, Catan is situated in the area of today’s Azores and, in terms of size, encompasses all islands of the group. As described in Rebecca Gable’s novel “The Settlers of Catan,” in 850 B.C.E. Catan was first settled by a seafaring Nordic people.

In real history, the Azores were discovered and taken in possession by Portuguese seafarers in 1427 and 1432.

Therefore, it stands to reason that – in fictitious history – Catan is (re)discovered by Portuguese seafarers at the beginning of the 15th century, and that some decades later conquistadores from all countries of the Old World set out for Catan like barbarian conquerors, to steal from the island what they regard as its only valuable good: gold.

„Barbarian Attack!“ The shrill cry came from the village square and jolted the inhabitants of a small coastal settlement awake. Siward the Scout stood at the center of the square. Spots of hectic red burned on his cheeks as he told people that three ships had landed on the shore and soldiers with strangely shaped iron hats were pouring out of them.

“Don’t panic, folks!” said the village leader to calm the distraught settlers who, only scantily dressed, came running to the village square. “The barbarians won’t waste their time with our small village. They are only interested in the city with its rich merchants and craftsmen.”

The village leader is right about that. The barbarians are dangerous only for principalities that have at least one city. And even this is only the case if the prince does not have enough units to fend the invaders off with.

To resist the barbarians when a “Barbarian Attack” event occurs, a prince (player) must have placed at least as many units as he has victory points from cities, metropolises, and city expansions. In this context, all units count, whether they are ships, heroes, or characters without hero status. If the prince has fewer units, he loses 2 resources. If he has more units and at least one city, he receives any 2 resources of his choice.

There is a total of three Barbarian Attack events. According to the normal rules, those events would be quite innocuous, and no prince would feel compelled to take major precautions against the Barbarian Attack. However, since the attack of the barbarians is the theme, the rules for preparing the event card stack were slightly modified for this Theme Game:
Momentarily set aside the 3 Barbarian Attack event cards and the Yule card. Then shuffle the other event cards of the Basic Set together with the Retreat of the Barbarians event card and place 3 cards face down. Place the Yule card on top. Shuffle the other 6 event cards together with the 3 Barbarian Attack cards and place them face down on the remaining stack – that is, on top of the Yule card.

If a Barbarian Attack is drawn during the game, place the card under the 4 topmost cards of the event card stack instead of returning it to the bottom of the event card stack as usual.

That way, the barbarians arrive quite frequently and force the prince to brace himself for the attacks. Let’s see how our prince prepares for the Barbarian Attack.

The prince stood, with his legs apart, on the tower of his Border Fortress, giving the Barbarian Stronghold a sullen look. The Stronghold stood out like an ugly boil, marring the beauty of his land. The barbarians seemed to be getting ready for an attack on his principality.

“Osmund,” the prince shouted. “Are we prepared?”

“We were, my prince. Unfortunately, Marie the Shieldmaiden made eyes at our Candamir, so that he defected to the princess of the opposing principality.”
“That disloyal scoundrel! May Odin’s ravens come after him! What do we do now?”

“We’re facing a difficult situation, my prince. All our problems would be solved in one fell swoop if we succeed in winning over Arnd the Strategist.”
“Then hire him, Osmund. Or is there anything that prevents you from doing so?”
“Arnd demands a new sword in exchange for his service. Regrettably, we don’t have the ore to forge one.”
“What?“ roared the prince. “Shall a shabby ore decide the fate of my principality? Either you come up with a solution right now, or I sell you as a slave to the robbers!”.
Osmund hesitated for a moment. “I might have an idea, my prince. But it requires a little gold.”

“I only have one nugget of gold. How do you want to get ore for it so fast? You’re not going to roll the dice in the White Raven Tavern, are you?”

But that’s exactly what Osmund did. And he was lucky. Not only did he win a big lump of ore for Arnd’s sword, he also won back the prince’s gold. During a celebration – true Catanians are always up for celebrations, even in the face of an impending Barbarian Attack – the prince was thus able to win over Wolfgang the Street Performer. Even if the Street Performer was better at playing a lute than at wielding a sword, he still reinforced the lines of defense. And so the prince only needed one more unit to stop the barbarian hordes and even defeat them.

And how does the princess in the neighboring principality fare at the same time?

“I hate celebrations!” the princess ranted and nervously brushed a stray lock of hair out of her face. “Now we also lost the Street Performer to the prince. Castellan, do something!”
The short-sighted Castellan peered intently out of the window of the Castle‘s tower room. “You worry too much. There are no barbarians as far as the eye can see.”

“But they’re coming, Castellan! Siward, the prince’s scout, allegedly has sighted them. And for what other reason does the prince reinforce the lines of his units in such a frenzied manner?”

The Castellan sighed. “But just recently we have built a Caravel, by means of which – due to a Relocation - we strengthened the power of our fleet, and we have placed another unit in our Border Fortress. Considering that our resource supplies are depleted, we can’t do more at the moment, my lady.”

The princess rolled her eyes. “I can’t stand your monotonous ‘we can’t do more’ and ‘depleted resource supplies’ any longer, Castellan. Is your vocabulary really that limited? Get out of my sight and send me Baroc the Barbarian.“

Hunched over, but on the inside happy to escape the princess’s bad temper, the Castellan left the room. Soon after, a stately warrior in iron armor entered the tower room.

“At your service, my princess!”

The princess liked the resourceful barbarian; she had been able to persuade him – with gold and a seductive smile – to change sides.

“My dear Baroc,” the princess benevolently greeted the warrior, “you know about my problem. I trust that your resourcefulness will replenish my resource supplies.”

“Well, princess, first of all, it was a mistake to build the Arsenal. For your enemies, the weapons stored there are a coveted bounty, which is why they will increasingly try to invade your city. You should have invested your resources in the Secret Brotherhood. The secret brothers have connections to the barbarians and can assuage the consequences of a potential defeat.”
The princess’s nicely curved lips tightened into a thin line. She just couldn’t take any criticism.
“But it is not my intention to lecture you. At least you have a Bailiwick. Use it, and new possibilities will open up to you.”

So the princess called the bailiff. He advised her to arrange a Contest of the Heroes.
“Great idea!” the princess rejoiced. “Didn’t Candamir recently change sides, thanks to my dear Marie? Then he should prove himself now and compete against one of the prince’s heroes.”
Of course, Candamir won the contest and thus provided the princess with the resources she needed to reinforce her Border Fortress with another unit.

Now let’s take another look at the realm of the prince:

“For what purpose am I supporting you?” raged the prince. “So that you bring me shame all the time? If you don’t immediately replace the wool I lost to the princess during the contest, I will …”
“… sell you as a slave to the robbers,” Osmund cut in, unperturbed by the prince’s words. And I already know whom to rob then, Osmund grimly thought.
“My prince, why don’t you suggest an Alliance Against the Barbarians to the princess. That will make your subjects optimistic, and they won’t complain if you raise a special tax.”

That way, the prince got another unit for his Border Fortress just in time, because shortly afterwards the barbarians attacked the two principalities. As expected, repelling the invaders wasn’t difficult for the Catanian units. And the princess still took it up a notch. She ordered Siegfried, Vanquisher of the Barbarians to pursue the defeated invaders, which he did so successfully that the Retreat of the Barbarians was not a very orderly retreat. It actually looked as if the barbarians were running away from the devil himself.

If a player successfully survives the Barbarian Attack, he may rotate his Triumph Card to the next higher level instead of taking two resources. The Triumph card is a marker card a player automatically places as soon as he has built his first city. It is conveniently placed on an empty space above or below any region. It can be removed from there at any time and placed at a different location if the space is needed for a region expansion.

In my last blog post, I promised to introduce the new Tournament rules at this point. They are now available for download at catan.com.

I am currently working on the concept for the second expansion, “Age of Gold” (working title). The editorial team will probably need until spring of next year to discuss, test, and finalize the concept and all the corresponding cards. At that point, I will get back to you right here in this blog space and introduce “The Era of Explorers” set (working title). Until then, I wish all readers of this blog post lots of fun with the new cards of the “Age of Darkness” expansion.

Klaus Teuber

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“The Era of Merchant Princes” Theme Set is played with the Theme Set of the same name and the Basic Cards I have introduced in part 5 of my series of blog posts about the reform of the Card Game. In the fictitious history of Catan, “The Era of Merchant Princes” Theme Set is set in the 14th century and follows “The Era of Discovery,” a Theme Set of the second game expansion planned for fall 2012.
The treasures and the gold of the discovered neighboring islands allow trade to flourish. The rulers of the two principalities compete for economic supremacy on Catan. Powerful merchant princes and – as already in “The Era of Gold” – trade ships play a central role in this context.

Therefore, the prince is well-advised to hire a Shipbuilder. The redheaded giant of Scottish ancestry is not only an asset at celebrations: he also manages to economize lumber and wool in such a way that building a trade fleet is noticeably easy on the prince’s resource supplies. And if a Pirate Ship converts a trade ship into a ship wreck – pay this skilled craftsman 1 gold, and the trade ship quickly is like new again.

A prince who wants to boost trade should offer Residences to his merchants. It actually isn’t that expensive. The prince only has to own a city and provide a building site above or below an appropriate region – the merchant will then generously take care of the building costs for the Residence.

The Cloth Merchant’s Residence must be placed adjacent to a pasture region. At his prince’s behest, the cloth merchant henceforth converts two wool into one commerce point. (The Residence is rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise.) We don’t even see the intermediate stage “cloth” – that’s how fast the cloth is sold and the trade boosted.

The Paper Merchant’s Residence can only become active if it is adjacent to a forest. The paper merchant converts the forest’s lumber into paper. Again, we don’t spend time dealing with the intermediate stage “paper.” We or, respectively, the princes are only interested in the final result. On level three – after three times converting lumber into paper and rotating the card – that result consists of one commerce point, one progress point, and one victory point.

The bell tolls for everyone at some point. Merchants are no exception. But don’t worry, they won’t be swept away by a hurricane. Actually, the Hour of the Master Merchants event has a downright positive effect: without paying a single resource, we just rotate all Residences to the next higher level.

“Oh dear!” exclaims the cloth merchant, bemoaning his destitute situation. “Over there, on the eastern pasture, the sheep multiply like rabbits, and here, on the pasture adjacent to my residence, my rams seem to be dedicated celibates. With a situation like that, I can hardly be of service to you, my prince.”
If the prince is smart, he acts upon his merchant’s complaint and lets a Wainwright settle in his principality. The Wainwright will then see to it that the merchant gets the wool from sheep of other pastures.

Sheep need to be shorn. Wool must be spun and woven into cloth. Lumber is waiting to be made into paper. Who is supposed to do all that? Well, the middle class, of course, which – also on Catan – consists of craftsmen, the backbone of any productive society. Our prince knows that too. And so he grants his backbone a Craft Guild, which immediately results in an upgrade of one of his Residences (the card is rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise).

Once a Craft Guild is built, it won’t take long until a Guild Master appears on the scene, to provide his lord with any two resources.

What the craftsmen have created is then spent by the merchants of the Commercial Harbor. If you have built a Commercial Harbor, one time during your turn you may downgrade one of your Residences by 1 level (rotate the card 90 degrees clockwise) and take any 2 resources of your choice in exchange.

At the beginning of the game, the two Commercial Harbor cards are placed as a face-up expansion card stack. That way, both the prince and the princess can build a Commercial Harbor, which is absolutely advisable: if you have a Commercial Harbor, you may place a Trading Station in one of your opponent’s cities and then, once per your turn, pay your opponent 1 gold for any 1 resource of your choice. And if you play the Trade Monopoly, you may even take up to 3 resources of the same type from your opponent.

The Commercial Harbor also allows you to build a Lighthouse. A Lighthouse enables an adjacent trade ship to trade resources at a 1:1 rate. You need a Commercial Harbor for this to work, but if you don’t have one, being the owner of at least two trade ships also does the trick.

Having either a Commercial Harbor or two trade ships is also the requirement for Hergild the Master Merchant, a lighthouse keeper’s daughter who became rich. If the prince can meet one of the two requirements, Hergild will enable him to trade the resource for which he has a trade ship at a 1:1 rate as often as he wants.

Gero the Master Merchant is a little more modest. Two trade ships navigating off the coast are enough for him to provide his prince with any two resources.

One shouldn’t underestimate the importance of trade ships in this set. If the prince has more trade ships than the princess, he can play a Maritime Trade Monopoly. It allows him to demand one resource from the princess, for each trade ship he has in excess of her trade ship total. To avoid the princess losing her composure, however, he never takes more than two resources from her.

The events “Fortunate Trade Voyage” and “Capricious Sea” are also tailored to trade ships. The first of these two events helps provide the prince with two resources of the type traded by one of his trade ships. The second event either provokes a storm, which – should the prince not have a Lighthouse – sinks one of his trade ships, or it produces calm sea, which earns him one resource of his choice for each of his trade ships.

If the prince relies on trade ships and assiduously uses them to trade resources, the princess is well-advised to initiate the Master Merchants’ Alliance. By means of this Alliance, each time the prince performs a 2:1 or 3:1 trade the princess receives one resource of the type paid by the prince during his trade. The princess could also build a Pirate Ship (which is also included in the set) and use it to sink one of the prince’s trade ships.

Olaf the Merchant Ship Captain is the first hero to enter the Catan scene who also has a commerce point besides a skill point. By order of the prince, the peaceful merchant ship captain turns into a dangerous pirate who takes two resources from the princess. Afterwards, the commerce point is lost, of course, because Olaf retires with part of the bounty.

The Trading Post offers another possibility to trade resources favorably. You place it on an empty road, where it allows you to trade a resource between the adjacent regions once per your turn. For example, you may quickly convert one gold into one brick, which is much needed for road building.

If the princess has the trade advantage, the prince can make use of his connections to the Church and send his Mendicants into the opposing principality. We don’t know what kind of sermon the brothers deliver; however, they always successfully wheedle one or two resources from the princess.

The prince gladly uses the Brigand Camp as another effective means to reduce the princess’s commerce points. But there’s still more to this card. If he places it on one of the princess’s roads, the robbers occasionally intercept a merchant who is on his way to the princess’s Marketplace, the result being that the prince receives 1 gold each time the princess uses her Marketplace to store a resource. The prince can thus lean back and relax while calmly focusing on further expanding his principality.

When the prince no longer needs the Brigand Camp, he sounds the Tactical Retreat. Then he can remove one of the buildings he placed in the princess’s domain. He receives two resources in exchange – one of them comes from the princess, who definitely is happy that she got rid of the unwelcome building.

Maybe those resources are the crucial resources for the prince to build the Commercial Metropolis and thus maybe win the game. Of course, the prince must have met the requirements to build the Commercial Metropolis: either having 6 commerce points or a Residence of the highest level. The Commercial Metropolis is placed on a city and brings 2 additional victory points.

The three sets of the Age of Darkness expansion extend the possibilities of the Duel of the Princes variant. With this expansion, the players now have a total 6 sets at their disposal, 3 of which are chosen for playing the Duel. For all those who are interested in the selection criteria, here is an excerpt from the game rules:

“The Duel of the Princes” is played according to the already known rules; only the event card stack is assembled differently. Each player chooses 1 Theme Set from the available Theme Sets (the starting player chooses first). The third Theme Set is chosen by lot: take 1 event card from each of the Theme Sets that have not been chosen yet, shuffle them face down, and draw one card at random. The card drawn determines the third set to be included in the Duel. Alternatively, you may want to leave things entirely to chance: take one card from each available Theme Set, shuffle them, and draw 3 cards at random; to play, use the 3 sets these cards belong to. Either way, put the Theme Sets you don’t use back into the box until you start a new game. 

In my next blog post, I will introduce “The Era of Barbarians” Theme Set and give an account of the most important rules of the Tournament Game.

Klaus Teuber

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Age of Darkness -
“The Era of Intrigue” Theme Set

Part 9 of my series of blog posts about The Rivals for Catan had been announced for the beginning of 2011. Unfortunately, the development of the game expansion took longer than originally planned. In order to sufficiently test the cards of the expansion and harmonize them optimally with each other, the release date – and thus, this blog post – was postponed.

Now, in September of this year, the German edition of the first “The Rivals for Catan” expansion has finally been published, and the English edition is scheduled for the fourth quarter of this year. Its title is “Age of Darkness,” and it contains “The Era of Intrigue,” “The Era of Merchant Princes,” and “The Era of Barbarians” Theme Sets. I first present “The Era of Intrigue” below.

The theme of this set is the controversy between the worshippers of Odin and the Christians. The beginning of this conflict is also portrayed in Rebecca Gablé’s novel “The Settlers of Catan.”

The key events of the set are the two “Religious Dispute” cards. If a Religious Dispute occurs, both players lose their hand of cards. Churches and Temples – the cards of the face-up draw stack – minimize losses. Furthermore, a Temple and the cards that require a Temple strengthen your access to your own draw stacks, and a Church gives you the opportunity to lure away opposing heroes and earn additional gold. And if you have built both a Church and a Temple, you may build the Great Thingstead and end the Religious Dispute.

The two heroes Judith, Guardian of the Church and

Bran, Defender of the Temple are also very important in this set. In the Basic Game, the Town Hall was placed on the Parish Hall, thereby enhancing its function; in a similar fashion, Judith is placed on a Church. Judith protects the Church from all actions and events, while the functions of the Church as such remain in effect. The victory point of the Church is also depicted on the “Judith” card (one victory point for Judith and one for the Church). The same applies to Bran and the Temple.
But let’s give Judith and Bran a chance to chat a little with each other and, in the process, introduce us to the remaining cards of the set.

Judith: A beautiful island, this Catan. But only my Church makes the land perfect.

Bran: Soon, churches will spring up like mushrooms here. I should put a stop to this with Odin’s Temple.

Judith: Don’t you dare, you godless man!

Bran: Godless? Who? I? I do believe in gods! Odin, Loki, Freyja, Thor …

Judith: But there is only one God: mine! And mind you, he created Heaven, Earth, and Man.

Bran: Oh, were you there? I wasn’t, actually. Still, I know that it was Odin who created Ask and Embla, the first two human beings.

Judith: Ridiculous! For one, the first humans were called Adam and Eve, and then, how is a god of war supposed to be able to create life? Your god sends people to their deaths, mine died for mankind.

Bran: In Valhalla, Odin drinks with all the warriors who die in combat with his name on their lips. Can a warrior expect anything better than such a paradise? If you come a little closer, sweet Judith, I’ll gladly tell you more about Odin and Valhalla.

Judith: Before courting me, you should get a bath or, even better, be baptized and become converted. Maybe my Bishop can see to that.

Bran: You call it converting if your Bishop wants to snatch my gold? I prefer to send him to the Sacrificial Site; there he can make himself useful on the sacrificial stone.

Judith: You’ll definitely not send him there, you ill-bred oaf!

Bran: Very well then, as a confidence-building measure I’ll let your Bishop go. I’ll ask the Priestess of the Norns for help instead.

Judith: What kind of pagan nonsense is that again?

Bran: The Norns are wise women who live by the roots of the World Ash, next to a well, and determine our fate. They just gave Odin’s Priest into my hand. I’m going to introduce him to you. But beware! You might feel a bit rattled afterwards.

Judith: Heavens, such ill-smelling words. I think I’m going to faint. What was it again I wanted to do?

Bran: Convert me?

Judith: Right, I wanted to sic my Missionary on you. But where is he? Heavens, could it be that this horrible priest put my servant of God to flight?

Bran: Why not? Sometimes, Odin moves in mysterious ways too.

A little later …

Judith: Ah, there he is again, our good Missionary. If he succeeds in leading one of your heroes to the Lord’s pasture, he can make up for his blunder.

Bran: Vegetarian food for Odin’s warriors? What a joke! But before my heroes might actually fall for the tricks of such a pretty church guardian, I let Godfrey intrigue a little.

Judith: Don’t push my patience to the limits!

Bran: I can’t help it, the Missionary is now on my side.

Judith: Bah, without a Church he won’t be useful for you.

Bran: Then I build one.

Judith: And what does your god say about competition?

Bran: Odin isn’t vain, he is more of a pragmatist, just like me. As long as he is the stronger one, he doesn’t care much about other gods. Besides, this stupid Religious Dispute loses its bite if the few Christians in my principality also have a place where they can pray.

Judith: You think you’re pretty clever, right?

Bran: I am clever, because your former Missionary now does his missionary work in your principality and gives me Reiner the Miller.

Judith: I gladly do without that disloyal soul. Fortunately, the Master of the Brotherhood is on my side and compensates me for my loss with gold.

Bran: Does he help you because he believes in your God?

Judith: No.

Bran: So he believes in Odin?

Judith: No.

Bran: Does he believe in anything at all?

Judith: I have no idea. He always drivels about tolerance and Enlightenment.

Bran: Your masterly brother seems not to be of this world.

Judith: Maybe, but I don’t care. I build a Brewery for my loyal heroes now and invite them to the Lord’s Supper with bread and beer.

Bran: Shouldn’t it be wine?

Judith: No, beer. Some ignorant monks mistranslated that.

Bran: I see. If you need a clear, delicious elixir for your beer, I could supply you with some barrels of water from Odin’s Fountain.

Judith: For all I care, you can give your pagan water to your hogs. I’ll definitely not add it to my beer.

Bran: Too bad, I thought that in return you’d tell me who was the exceptionally gifted stone sculptor who carved the cross in the rock of your Pilgrimage Site. I could almost get jealous when I see you selling trinkets for gold in your stands. Was it perhaps Michael the Master Builder?

Judith: No, there is no stone sculptor, and the Master Builder only helped me build my magnificent Church. It was my God himself who burnt the cross into the rock, by means of a huge thunderbolt. It’s a miracle your Odin would hardly be capable of.

Bran: Only your stupid subjects believe that. You know what? I’ll give you the Red Light Tavern! And I throw in some nice ladies, for free. It won’t take them much time to tease your stone sculptor’s name out of your heroes.

Judith: If one of my heroes shows up in that disastrous place, he’ll get only stale bread in the Lord’s Supper. Speaking of bread, it is running short due to this disloyal Miller. And it seems that you can make extensive use of him. I think I have to build a see for my Bishop.

Bran: What does your Bishop’s See have to do with the Miller?

Judith: Well, in return for his see the Bishop promised me to threaten the Miller with excommunication if he doesn’t retreat to the desert as a hermit. There he can grind rock into sand, as a penance for his disloyalty. If I can’t have the Miller, you shall not have him either. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth …

Bran: By the way, Odin also lost an eye. I guess he still has his teeth though. They actually have something in common, our gods. And therefore we also have something in common, right?

Judith: Nonsense, my God hasn’t lost an eye. That stupid saying just slipped out. My God wants reconciliation. If our enemy smites us on our right cheek, we are supposed to turn him the left cheek also.

Bran: Interesting. So let’s do something for our reconciliation. First, we drink to Good Neighbors, or at least to better ones!

Judith: If you like. After all, the Bible says that I shall also love my enemies.

Bran: And then I build the Great Thingstead for us.

Judith: And what’s that supposed to be good for?

Bran: For resolving disputes amicably. For talking to each other. Besides, behind those rocks are some very romantic spots for people who just fell in love …

Judith: What’s that supposed to mean?

Bran: That we shouldn’t always quarrel. As a good Christian, what would you do if I kiss your right cheek now?

Judith: I’d probably have to turn you the left cheek also …

A little later…

Judith: But the Bible doesn’t say anything about the mouth!

Bran: How do you know? Maybe you remember now …

Up to now, it was only possible to expand settlements, cities, and regions. For the first time now, the game expansion includes cards that can also be placed on free roads.
In the “Era of Intrigue” Theme Set, the “Red Lantern Tavern” belongs to this type of cards. Since the card is placed on a road and not on a free building site, we refer to it as a road complement. The function of a “complemented” road remains in effect; it only receives additional functions or properties. Therefore, the illustration of each road complement still depicts a road.

The “Age of Darkness” expansion not only offers new and exciting Theme Games but also adds to the Duel. Together with the new sets of the expansion, we now have a total of six different sets. The many possibilities of combining three sets make for an even more varied Duel that always presents new challenges.
The new cards enable the players, for the first time, to use the Tournament mode in a meaningful way. Therefore, we will also program the Tournament mode for the Catan Online World.

Probably in a few weeks, I will introduce “The Era of Merchant Princes,” the second set of the expansion.

Klaus Teuber

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Introduction

The “Era of Progress” Theme Game is played with the Theme Set of that name and the basic cards I introduced in part 5 of my series of blog posts about the reform of the Card Game. In the fictitious history of Catan, the environment of this set belongs to the 15th century. After Portuguese seafarers discovered the island in the Atlantic Ocean, a brisk cultural exchange between Catan and continental Europe begins. Both in the north and east of the island, a university is formed. However, the Portuguese seafarers not only bring new scientific knowledge to Catan; they also bring plagues.
Due to time constraints, this time I do not include a frame story similar to the one I used in the past two blog posts to introduce the cards of the “Era of Gold” and “Era of Turmoil” Theme Sets.

The University

The University takes center stage in this set. It can be found in the face-up draw stack. If you previously built an Abbey (Basic Set) or a Library, you may build the University directly, without having to draw it into your hand first.

The Library – a building that is required to build the University – costs only 4 resources, provides a victory point and, once you have built it, allows you to choose a card from one of the draw stacks. It is, therefore, an attractive alternative to the Abbey.

The University allows you to play a number of useful cards. For example, the two Three-Field System action cards provide you with additional grain income, and the two Mineral Mining cards increase your ore supplies.

You may use the two Chief Cannoneers to either take the strength advantage away from your opponent or to protect your own strength advantage.

The Building Crane is another advantage resulting from the University. If you have the Building Crane, each city expansion whose building costs exceed 4 resources costs you any one resource of your choice less. If you want to build the Parliament, the most expensive building of this set (it costs 7 resources), having the Building Crane would surely be an advantage to you. The Parliament is definitely worth it: its two victory points allow you to quickly catch up or even win the game.

The Plagues

The set includes a total of 5 event cards. Besides the two Invention cards already known from the Basic Set, the set contains three Plague cards. A Plague card causes each region adjacent to a city to lose one resource. That way, you can inflict considerable damage to a player who incautiously relies on city building.

There is an antidote, however: the Bath House. The regions of a city where a Bath House was built are protected from Plagues. So that more than one city can be protected from Plagues, 3 Bath Houses are available to the players. If things are already messed up, meaning that the Plague has already befallen one or more of your cities, a Pharmacy will console you a little for the resource loss. After a Plague is played, the Pharmacy provides its owner with any one resource of his choice – whether or not he was affected by the Plague.

If there is a Bath House, a Doctor isn’t far away. Therefore, this set contains 2 of these action cards. In combination with a Bath House, the Doctor has the effect to increase the settlers’ productivity, which manifests itself as an additional resource received in the two regions adjacent to a Bath House.

Other Cards

A set whose theme is progress shouldn’t be without a Town Hall. The Town Hall gives you an advantage: when you exchange a card from your hand at the end of your turn, you may choose a card for free. You might wonder now if that makes the Parish Hall redundant. Yes, that’s indeed the case. For this reason, the Town Hall is built directly on top of the Parish Hall and thus doesn’t occupy a new building site.

Sometimes, a Town Hall is also a place for diplomacy. Therefore, it stands to reason that it serves as a requirement for playing the action Card Guido the Ambassador. Guido allows you to choose a card from the discard pile. This can be very helpful, for example, if you want to take advantage of the Three-Field System again. The action card Gustav the Librarian has the same effect. Needless to say that to play Gustav, you don’t need a Town Hall. You need a Library. Both action cards may also be played without the building requirement if you have fewer victory points than your opponent.

Benjamin the Traveling Scholar may also be used without the building requirement. With the help of Benjamin, you once more receive the resource of each region whose number you rolled at the beginning of your turn.

In “The Era of Progress,” dealings between the players are more peaceful than in the “Era of Turmoil” set. The threat in the shape of Plagues comes from the outside, and you should try early enough to protect your principality via Bath Houses from resource loss. The University and the cards linked to it are not as strong as in the old Card Game any more, but they still are powerful enough to decide the outcome of a game.

The Duel

If you have played all three Theme Games and are familiar with the cards, the Duel mode will be a new challenge for you. In the Duel, all Theme Sets are used, although in a slimmed-down form. Many a reader of my blog post may have asked themselves what those funny little half moons on some cards mean. Well, if a card is marked with a moon, it “goes to sleep” during the Duel. That is, it is set aside. This means that we play the Duel with all the basic cards but only about half the cards of each Theme Set.
As a consequence, also the key cards only appear once: in the “Era of Gold” set there is only one Merchant Guild, in the “Era of Turmoil” set only one Hedge Tavern, and in the “Era of Progress” set only one University. You thus have to decide early on which strategic direction to pursue, or you must use tactics and change direction if your opponent has snatched a key building from under your nose. For example, if your opponent has the Merchant Guild in his hand or has even built it, you may try to counterattack with the Hedge Tavern or with the University and the cards linked to it.

The Duel mode offers a broad strategic and tactical spectrum whose appeal definitely compares to that of the Tournament mode of the old Card Game. However, the Duel mode’s great advantage over the Tournament mode is the fact that you don’t need a second game, because all required cards are included in the “Rivals for Catan” game box. And for all players who are not so fond of composing their own decks, the Duel mode has the advantage of being able to start playing without spending much time on preparations and still having the full range of cards to choose from.

I’m not suggesting, though, that the Tournament mode is dead. It will be revived with the Expansion I, whose current working title is “Dark Times.”

The German version of the “Rivals for Catan” game will probably be delivered to stores in Germany the same week this blog post is published. Completing the revised version of the old Card Game was a long journey, and Peter Gustav Bartschat, Dr. Reiner Düren, and Sebastian Rapp walked it together with me. It also was an exciting journey, filled with many test games and stimulating discussions that sometimes were profound and often also humorous and exhilarating. A beautiful experience, for which I would like to say a big thank you to the three of them. My special thanks go to Michael Menzel, who gave Catan its wonderful illustrations and thus justified the slogan “Catan comes to life.”

In my next blog post – presumably by the end of this year – I will talk about the first of the three Theme Games of Expansion I, named “The Era of Intrigue.”

PS:

The illustrator Michael Menzel used a photo of Peter Gustav Bartschat as a model for the “Gustav the Librarian” card. Together with Dr. Reiner Düren, Peter Gustav Bartschat wrote the Encyclopædia Catanica. He also published two detective stories and is the author of the book “Im Zeichen des Sechsecks” (“Under the Sign of the Hexagon”), published in Germany on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of “The Settlers of Catan.”
Photos of my two sons Guido and Benjamin served as models for “Guido the Ambassador” and “Benjamin the Traveling Scholar.”

Klaus Teuber

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A Cannon Story – Part 1

In 1997, for the first time I held the “Tournament Set for the Card Game” in my hands: the dignified ancestor of today’s Tournament Card Game that enthusiasts now play with highly developed strategies. Not yet suspecting the kind of gaming enthusiasm I would soon be in the throes of, I looked at the “Cannon” card, for which Klaus Teuber had written the following text: “The end of knights is near!”

“Well, that’s a great start,” I said to Babsi, my wife. “It is a popular mistake to believe that there was a relation between the advent of firearms and the downfall of the feudal system. In fact, social changes such as the capital accumulation of the free imperial cities made it possible to raise large infantry armies in the first place…”

“Calm down,” Babsi responded. “It’s only a game.”

Both of them were right, Babsi with her sense of realism that is always a little scary to me and Klaus Teuber with his prophetic Cannon card text, because this coming September – anno Domini 2010 – the Catan Card Game knights will be dead, carried off just like their entire, more or less medieval Card Game world.

And who dug their grave? Was it indeed a cannon?

Let’s review, step by step, the tragic events that cost the lives of Karl the Strong, Lothar the Drunkard, and even Johanna the Warrior-Maiden.

Cannon

Olden Times

What time in history does the Catan Card Game actually belong to?

In a somewhat non-binding fashion, until now it took place sometime “in the past.” Maybe last Tuesday in the Middle Ages, in the commingled era we know from summertime events such as renaissance fairs where Charlemagne and Joan of Arc meet Prince Valiant and Xena at the fast food stand to exchange their cell phone numbers.

When Klaus Teuber developed the “Cataniverse,” he envisioned a parallel Iceland (located in a slightly warmer alternative universe). Rebecca Gablé portrayed this world, the beginnings of its settlement in the 9th century, and some of their inhabitants in great detail in her novel “The Settlers of Catan” published in Germany in 2003. In the games themselves, however, this setting in space and time wasn’t reflected for a long time.

Only the 2008 Viking edition of the game pieces and the new board game editions published in 2008 and 2010 brought at least this game closer to its roots.

The Settlers of Catan - The Novel (German hard cover)

Big Plans

Over the years, I sporadically contributed one or the other marginal idea for developing the Cataniverse, and in 2008 I was invited into the very small and very intensely working circle of editors of the Card Game.

The first project for me to participate in was the general revision of the Card Game. This was a task ten game designers would need ten years to accomplish. We were four people. So, how much time did we have? Right: two years. That’s something I one day should rub Ms. K.’s nose in, the math teacher who forty years ago tried to make me understand the rule of three.

And here are the three Card Game editors who allowed me to “join the game”:

Klaus Teuber. Wanting to introduce him to the reader of this page seems kind of pointless. Everyone knows his games. However, his many novel ideas regarding the solution of conflict situations in the rules system, his openness towards suggestions from coworkers who simply aren’t on a par with him in matters of success, his subtle and never offending humor, his ability to motivate a team whenever it has come to a dead end – those are the things you get to know only when closely collaborating with him for some time.

Dr. Reiner Düren: PhD Chemist, successful tournament player and involved with the gamer community since the beginnings of the Internet gaming scene, moderator of various forums, co-organizer in the Catan Online World, and one of the founders of the rules database “Encyclopœdia Catanica” (and currently the only person in charge of it). One seems to recognize the sharp, unerring eye of the chemist analyzing an unknown substance when he suddenly picks two or three points from a long list of rule and card concepts and, in a few words, clearly points out that a problem is lurking there, perhaps because a player who is the first to perform a certain action cannot be caught up with afterwards.

Sebastian Rapp. Sometimes I think that he must have played every game in the world at least one time – and remembers them. He always kept an eye on the objective of our shared task, and more than once he brought us back on track again when we enthusiastically pursued some witty idea without stopping. Witty ideas are actually kind of tricky: the people who developed them might like them a lot, but the real touchstone for an idea isn’t that its author likes it but whether or not it can make the game attractive for newcomers and keep seasoned players interested in the game for the long haul. The new, clearly structured rules system of “The Rivals for Catan” – with a minimum of requirements and exceptions – is, therefore, in great part due to Sebastian’s insistence on reminding us what it was we wanted to achieve.

Photo collage: Klaus Teuber, Dr. Reiner Düren, Sebastian Rapp

We Ask the Ones Who Know the Ropes

In 2008, when the four of us started to rack our brains over a comprehensive, fundamental, radical, and absolutely unprecedented revolution of the Catan Card Game, we as accomplished Catan experts inevitably needed to first seize the opportunity to rewrite the Card Game, so as to match it with Catan’s history as an isolated Viking culture in the Atlantic Ocean.

Forget it!

At the beginning, it didn’t occur to us at all. So, for more than the entire first year of our collaboration, it still was “last Tuesday in the Middle Ages” on Catan. Meanwhile, we focused on constructing an inherently consistent rule from the compilation of individual cases that gradually had emerged over a period of 10 years.

Strange as it may sound: The biggest problem for the Card Game was its own success. This success generated a continuous demand for expansions. But expansions must introduce new aspects, and new aspects often interfere with the old system of rules. Therefore, in 2008 – its 11th year – the Card Game had already gone through two extensive rules reforms. The focus of these reforms had been on making it possible to use the existing game components – retrofitted with a couple of stickers containing text corrections – for play by modified rules. That way, the game unwittingly had been led into an almost impenetrable maze of rules; for potential newcomers, the game was hardly accessible anymore, while seasoned players, particularly experts of the challenging Tournament variant, felt quite at home in this maze.

We wanted to give newcomers simple access to an easygoing, entertaining game while at the same time retaining the strategic and tactical depth of the traditional Card Game for the “old Catanian hands.”

To please both target groups in each and every aspect of the game probably borders on the impossible – although I’m not quite sure yet on which side of it. But then again, it made this task even more challenging.

Well, the four of us are also old Catanian hands. And one of the greatest dangers a team like this must face is that it may get tunnel vision.

Therefore, already in the preparation phase, even before the first rule was formulated, we repeatedly seized the opportunity – or should I say “demanded the opportunity” – to play the Card Game with people who actually didn’t want to play it: either they didn’t like to play anyway or they already knew the Card Game but over time had turned their backs on it. Babsi belongs to the second group. She now has the car, and I have the cats.

Maybe the tests with non-card players were the most important thing we ever did during development. In our conversations with players who disapproved of the old Card Game, our “old hand” perspectives sometimes shifted so thoroughly that we occasionally felt we were looking at an entirely different game than was our opposite at the table.

Arnd Beenen and Klaus Teuber testing the prototype in Bilstein

Dark Clouds Gather Over Shiny Armors

June 20, 2009 was the day when the downfall of the Catanian knights began. But the knights weren’t the only ones unsuspectingly facing a brief and dark future; I also had no inkling of their impending fate when I jotted down the result of a test game with Babsi: “Different scoring of strength points and tournament points too complicated. Knights should only have ‘knight points,’ as an intuitively recognizable parallel to ‘mill points.’”

Personally, I didn’t find that too complicated at all, and I wrote so in one of my memos about the test games. Sebastian Rapp was the one who – with a few clear words – knocked the tunnel vision out of me and thus prompted me to first embrace Babsi’s view and then pursue that thought further. Thank you, Babsi and Sebastian. (I doubt that the knights would share my gratitude, because they’d probably continue to live on Catan for a long time to come hadn’t we pursued this line of thought further.)

But wasn’t Babsi right? At the time, fist and helmet symbols with numbers were printed on the knight cards. And what did the player who had accumulated the most fists get as a reward? A horseman token. Honestly, who’s supposed to understand that?

Forging Swords into Axes

At about the same time, Klaus Teuber had developed the concept that the individual Theme Sets should no longer be named “Knights & Merchants,” “Wizards & Dragons,” “Burgers & French Fries,” etc. Instead, the sets received names such as “The Era of Turmoil,” which arranged them in chronological order.

That was an idea I quickly got enthusiastic about. For me as an occasional author of historical novels, it was tempting to tinker around with the titles and themes of the individual cards against the backdrop of a concrete historical timeframe, which was something we had cared little about so far.

And so the death of the Catanian knights slowly approached:

If we have a chronological order of the sets, then the Basic Game must be at the beginning. In what era should it be set?

Looking back, it seems that a message written in glowing letters should have appeared in the sky above our heads: IN THE 9TH CENTURY ON THE NEWLY DISCOVERED CATAN OF COURSE, YOU DUMBOS!

In reality, however, we continued fiddling around with a variety of ideas for several weeks, until suddenly – as with a puzzle where one realizes that the cat has carried an important piece off into its basket – all loose ends of the thematic accommodation came together in a complete historical concept: the Basic Game corresponds to the early Catanian history and to the achievements that then continue as a tradition throughout all other eras. The Basic Game can be expanded by individual Theme Sets, which – in combination with the Basic Game – allow the players to reenact certain eras of the Catanian history one at a time.

After an idea is formulated as a coherent concept, it often seems so self-evident that one no longer can understand what was actually so difficult about it. But prior to formulating the concept, one often has to bury 69 “good ideas” because on closer examination, they all have drawbacks – until the 70th idea suddenly works.

The knights died on us in the process: a society on an archipelago with an isolationist cultural attitude would hardly develop the same kind of feudal system found on the European continent during the same period. Also, since we were following the setting of Rebecca Gablé’s Catan novel, we no longer had use for knights. The craftsmen, merchants, and seafarers that come to life in this novel are seasoned roughnecks – or at least turn into them as the story develops – but they aren’t knights.

Following the old Nordic sagas, we finally arrived at the concept for our heroes. However, they don’t just have “hero points,” as one might have assumed due to the fact that we pursued Babsi’s triggering suggestion regarding the “knight points.” After extensive consideration of the alternatives and their consequences, we eventually kept the original dichotomy, although with different focuses: the old “strength points” and “tournament points” should thematically describe the same thing, because in a tournament, mostly combat techniques are tested.

Strength is now represented by an ax symbol, and the player who has the strongest hero now receives a game piece depicting an ax instead of receiving – as before – something totally different (for example, a plaster model by Eyjafjallajökull).

We now have juxtaposed the strength of a hero – that is, his physical power potential – with his skill. The German word for “skill” – “Geschick” – also has another meaning: “fate.” Given this context, skill not only symbolizes a hero’s skill as far as negotiations and social problem solution approaches are concerned, but also his fate. “No wonder,” people who know the Catan novel will say to themselves, “that the values of Candamir and Austin are so different.”

Osmund - Strength and Skill

A Cannon Story – Part 2

That was the story of the Catanian knighthood’s downfall. Klaus Teuber already anticipated it in 1997, when he wrote on his Cannon card: “The end of knights is near!”

But what happened to the Cannon itself?

As you will learn in Klaus Teuber’s next blog post about the “Era of Progress” Theme Set, it meanwhile has also met its match.

Peter Gustav Bartschat

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Introduction

The “Era of Turmoil” Theme Game is played with the Theme Set of that name and the basic cards I introduced in part 5 of my series of blog posts about the reform of the Card Game. In the fictitious history of Catan, the environment of this set belongs to the mid-9th century, which is about 100 years after the first settlers arrived on Catan. The Viking chief Carl Gabelbart and his men are stranded on Catan. To conquer the island, he sows discord among the Princes and brings traitors, archers, and arsonists into the arena. Heinrich the Sentinel is in the thick of the action. His confessions will give us a better understanding of the Era of Turmoil.

Confessions of a Sentinel

Allow me to introduce myself: I am Heinrich. Strictly speaking, it’s Heinrich the Sentinel, a loyal subject of the Prince. Well, let’s say: a fairly loyal subject.

Actually, the Prince is kind of in my bad books. After all those years of faithful service in the struggle against robbers and pirates, he fobbed me off with a job as a sentinel. He might as well have made me his latrine supervisor.

I’m living on the second floor of the city gate. It has a bedroom so small my predecessor must have been a midget. I’m not a midget, however, so I have to bend my knees and duck my head in order to squeeze myself into that lousy hole at night.

And my reward?
“Here, my dear Heinrich,” he said, “take this loaded die and get your payment yourself. There are so many boneheads in the Hedge Tavern, it shouldn’t be difficult for you to fleece some of the scoundrels there.”

And then he gave me a horn I should blow to warn the citizens when enemies were threatening the city. I must confess, until this day I haven’t blown the horn one single time. It isn’t possible anyway, because I plugged the mouthpiece. It serves me much better as a receptacle, to be filled with mead or beer. I quite often raise the horn to the Prince: “Thank you, my Prince. I drink to your downfall!”

It’s true, I’m really mad at him. Each morning, when I wake up in my dull chamber with aching limbs and a stiff neck, I curse his Highness.
The only bright spot in my life is Irmgard, my dear friend who lives in a spacious cottage in the swamp. Sometimes I sneak to her house at night. Then she pampers me with delicious food, and I enjoy falling asleep in her arms with my limbs comfortably extended. After dinner, we often have an animated conversation. There is one topic, however, that I rather avoid, because when the Prince is mentioned and I just can’t stop myself from making one or two bad remarks about him, I get barred from the cottage during the following days.

Irmgard adores the Prince – please don’t ask me why. She supports him whenever she can. For example, if a hero abandons the Prince or the Princess of the neighboring principality burns down one of his buildings, she pulls a few strings and sends the Prince a load of resources as a consolation.

The other night it happened again. The Princess must have smuggled an Arsonist into our city. Irmgard woke up from the screams in the city and ran out of the cottage. The glow from a building going up in flames illuminated the sky over the city.
“Ha!” I rejoiced, “I think the Tithe Barn is burning up and with it, all the grain and wool the old scrooge got out of the peasants.”
I smiled at Irmgard, but I might have guessed that she didn’t smile back. Her green eyes gave me a harsh look, and it was clear that for the next days I would have to spend the night in my uncomfortable bedroom again.

“Had he built a Fire Brigade, this wouldn’t have happened,” I grumbled. “Had you done your job instead of being here with me, it wouldn’t have happened either!” she answered, went back into her cottage and locked the door.
The next morning, when I was standing in front of my city gate in a bad mood, a wispy youngster came staggering towards me. “Where are YOU heading, boy?”
“To the … city of the … Princess, Mister … uh …Sentinel,” he answered haltingly, reeking of alcohol. “I … I’m an Archer and I’m supposed to … um … finish off the Princess … no … the hero of the Princess.”
“Don’t call me MISTER SENTINEL!” I ranted. “That sounds even more ridiculous than ‘night watch.’ You think you are an Archer? At best, you’re a boy who hasn’t even learned to properly carry his bow. Instead of getting drunk in the Hedge Tavern, you’ll go to the Drill Ground now and practice shooting a bow and arrow. If you come back sober in a couple of days, I might let you pass. But don’t you shoot a swordsman there!”
As the boy toddled off, out of the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of a scurrying shape. Somebody was actually trying to sneak through MY city gate. In one leap, I stood next to the intruder and grabbed his right hand. “What are you doing here, you scoundrel?” “I’m not a scoundrel,” the captured guy stammered, who turned out to be another youngster reeking of booze. “I’m a Traitor.”

Of course, the Princess also had a Hedge Tavern in her city. It seemed that she had hired the young lad there to put one over on the Prince. I definitely wouldn’t have minded that, but I also had to think of myself and my finances in particular.

“I hope you’re aware that I have to blow my horn now, meaning that in the future you’ll only be able to betray the rats in the Prince’s dungeon?”
Since the lad couldn’t know that my horn was not suited for blowing any more, he nodded anxiously and furtively looked around. He apparently was looking for an opportunity to escape, but I maintained my tight grip on his wrist.
“Here’s a conciliatory proposal. I’ll roll the die.” With my left hand, I pulled a die out of my vest and shoved it right under the Traitor’s nose. He gave me a blank look. “If I roll a 3, 4, or 5, I take the coins the Princess gave you for your treason and send you home. If I roll a different number, you may enter the city and I only take half of your coins. Agreed?”
Given that his only alternative were the rats in the dungeon, the lad nodded eagerly. He seemed to have lost his tongue. I dropped the loaded die. It fell to the ground, bounced a few times, and then – as expected – came to a stop with the 6 facing up.
“You were lucky, boy! Fate has decided that you may perform your task in the city.” I held out my hand and received half of the pay for his treason.

In the evening, the young Traitor appeared again. He had Carl Forkbeard in tow. Carl was a giant of a man and notorious for his voyages of plunder that terrorized the coasts of Catan. I knew that the Prince was negotiating with Carl because he wanted to win him over and have him among his followers. But that wasn’t going to happen now. Thanks to her Traitor, the Princess would be the one to have access to the hero carrying the huge double axe.

I smiled and let the odd couple pass through my city gate. As of now, Carl would ravage only one side of the island with his raids: the side belonging to my unbeloved Prince.

A couple of days later – I still wasn’t allowed to enter Irmgard’s cottage – Riots threatened the principality. A horde of peasants had been sighted from the Lookout Tower. Armed with sticks and forks, they were marching towards the city, determined and with grim faces.

The peasants’ anger didn’t come as a surprise to me. Without batting an eye, the Prince had ordered to rebuild the burnt-down Tithe Barn and once again collect the tithe from their grain and wool harvests.

The Chapel‘s bell sounded the alarm and the herald shouted, “Enemies at the gate! Citizens, barricade yourselves in your houses!”
The streets quickly became empty, and an eerie silence filled the city. Only the followers of the Prince were still out and about and gradually gathered in front of my city gate. A fight was about to occur. But before the Prince ordered his heroes to confront the peasants, he pulled an ace out of his sleeve.
The band of heroes opened ranks, and Sebastian the Itinerant Preacher stepped forward.

He wore a long, brown habit and his hair had silvery strands, which gave him a presence that exuded authority. He appeared to be above simple human needs such as food and shelter.
“What are you going to tell those poor devils?” I asked Sebastian.
“What I always preach in such situations – and what always helps – is this: ‘Whatever your worldly lord takes from you on Earth, the Lord will repay you for it a thousand times in heaven. But he who lays hands on his worldly lord will burn in hell for a thousand years.’”
Thus spoke Sebastian in front of the peasants, and the episode was over. Sebastian, unperturbed, moved on to continue spreading his heavenly pearls of wisdom among people.

A week later, I strolled across the Fairgrounds watching the hustle and bustle of the heroes of our city. They were preparing for the upcoming celebration. They were singing, making music, and dancing. Some were practicing elaborate speeches, others were performing a farce. Two heroes were competing in a spectacular sword fight exhibition.

On my way to the city gate, a messenger boy stopped me and handed me a message he was holding in his dirty little hand. It was from Irmgard; she invited me to go with her to the celebration of the two principalities which was taking place in the city of the Princess. It seemed that she had finally forgiven me. I gave the boy a coin and happily continued on my way. At the city gate, the young Archer was waiting for me – this time absolutely sober.

“Yes, you may go!” I told him good-humoredly before he could open his mouth and gave him a benevolent slap on his frail shoulder. “But don’t hit the target too well!”

And he didn’t.
Two weeks later, when I was sitting with Irmgard in the Princess’s magnificent Large Festival Hall enjoying the presentations of the celebration, an incident occurred that diminished my grudge against the Prince.

The Prince was standing next to his opponent the Princess, and both peacefully applauded the presentation of a young heroine who had sung a melancholy song about love and treason.

At the same time, behind the two applauding members of the royal family a hero of the Prince and a hero of the Princess, both armed with sword and shield, were getting ready for an exhibition fight.
The Archer had meanwhile sneaked up to the Festival Hall from behind and – through a small window – was aiming at the leg of the Princess’s hero. Shortly before the arrow left the bowstring with a faint whirring sound, the hero lowered his shield to scratch his shin with the shield’s rim. The arrow grazed the shield boss and then took another, more fateful direction.

In the dim light of the hall, nobody had noticed that an arrow had penetrated into the Prince’s rear end. The Prince suddenly stopped applauding, emitted a bloodcurdling scream and then jumped about like crazy, and nobody knew whether to applaud or call the guards. Only when the Prince reached back and tried to pull out the arrow, it began to dawn upon everyone what had happened.

Irmgard was so surprised and appalled that she didn’t notice my gleeful grin. Then, when she looked towards me, I already had put on a shocked face and shouted, “Our poor Prince!!! Get a doctor!”
Irmgard put her hand on my arm and smiled at me. I sighed; the next nights in her comfortable cottage were granted.

Notes Regarding the Theme Set

The face-up card stack available to both players consists of the two Hedge Tavern cards. If you have built a Hedge Tavern, you can put Traitors, Archers, and Arsonists onto your opponent. This means that in the Theme Game with this set, the players’ life is a little harder than in the “The Era of Gold” Theme Set I introduced in my last blog post. And if you have the strength advantage, you will often find opportunity to vex your opponent.

Gold also plays a major role in this set, because you can protect your units from the Riots event only if you have enough gold at that crucial moment.

In my next blog post, I will introduce the cards of the set “The Era of Progress” and explain the rules of the Card Game’s next level, the Duel of the Princes. I’ll say only this much now: The Duel of the Princes is played with the basic cards and the cards of all three Theme Sets.
And if someone hasn’t noticed yet: All cards and Theme Sets I describe in my blog posts about the new version of the Card Game are included in the box of the card game “The Princes of Catan.”

Klaus Teuber

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This is probably due to the fact that she relied mostly upon English sources.
However, the credibility of these sources may be doubted, as I will demonstrate below. Maybe the English are fighting tooth and nail to defend their reputation as the “motherland of soccer” because their national soccer team’s only World Cup title so far was achieved by means of two irregular goals.

In 2006, when Germany hosted the World Cup, Catan players from the western Munsterland region in Germany for the first time put forward the thesis that on Catan, soccer was played much earlier than in England.

I was fascinated by this theory and inquired on my own. Luck was on my side. A couple of days ago, a reputable Catanabilia dealer named Conrad Cowyes offered me parts of the lost Austin chronicle, which deals with sports on Catan.

After reading the first pages, I have to say that the history of soccer must largely be rewritten.

According to this chronicle, already a few years after reaching Catan the Catanians played with inflated sheep stomachs whose shape can still be recognized today in American/Canadian football, Australian rules football, and rugby, the relatives of soccer.

Also, sketches in the Austin chronicle reveal that the Catanians originally played on hexagonal fields. Thus, the midfield was of greater importance, and they must have played a 3-6-1 formation.

They didn’t shoot at goals at this time but at the space between two vertical bars. Since there was no limiting upper bar, short people had no business between the bars.

The Catanians had no problem keeping the turf trimmed short. The many sheep on Catan were effectively used as lawn mowers. The Catanians accepted the fact that the players used to step on droppings and frequently slipped on them, which oftentimes led to a “crappy game,” in the truest sense of the word.

The sheep that proliferated on the soccer fields provided another incentive for the game: some of the sheep were offered as prizes for the winner. However, both the spectators and the losers expected the winners to sacrifice the sheep to Odin afterwards and invite everyone to a feast.

The Catanians were also able to solve the problem of an early form of today’s hooliganism. The fans of the participating teams were separated during the match and could only gather at the corners of the field to support their teams.
Those who respected these rules were allowed to participate in an “afterplay” once the game had ended. During this afterplay, the fans had permission to beat each other up to their hearts’ content. Afterwards, peace reigned for weeks on end.
Those who didn’t stick to the rules were sent to the robbers’ quarry to break rocks.

It was popular among the spectators to bet sheep on the outcome of a game. It is said that some arrived with a lamb and left with a flock of sheep.

Gift for the Prince - a soccer ball

But the most important part of the chronicle is the section where Austin describes how the first international soccer match between England and Catan came about, which clearly proves that the English, to a great extent, distorted history in order to present their country as the motherland of soccer.

A storm had cast up an English ship on the coast of Catan. The English sailors were well received by the Catanians and soon came to like the soccer game. At first, the Englishmen were disappointed that their hosts presented them with a soccer ball as a welcome gift.

Sebastian the Itinerant Soccer Player

In their opinion, it was totally worthless because neither was it filled with mead nor could it be used to bash an opponent’s head in.

Sebastian the Itinerant Soccer Player quickly taught them the rules of the game.

And so, the first international soccer match didn’t take place on November 30, 1872 but many centuries earlier, on the island of Catan somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean.

Fraternal Feud - because of soccer

Here’s what Austin writes in his chronicle about that memorable day when the team of the settlers of Catan and the crew of the English ship faced each other in a soccer match:

Brigitta the Wise Woman - with soccer ball

“It didn’t start out well for the Catanians because of a dispute between coach Candamir and Osmund, his best player. They couldn’t agree on a tactic. As always, Candamir wanted to use the WM formation, while Osmund favored the new 4-2-3-1 formation.

Although Brigitta implored the gods, the dispute still continued after the game had started. So the Englishmen took advantage of the disagreement between the Catanians and quickly gained the lead.

But the tides turned when the English, at 5 pm sharp, briefly left the field to drink a cup of hot water with a drop of milk. Afterwards, the Catanians rapidly caught up.

Harald - with “widduzela”

Then, when Harald blew his widduzela, the Catanians no longer held back and launched an all-out attack to overwhelm the Englishmen.

Osmund - with soccer ball

Prudently, Sebastian had not told them that the game would end only after the last player was stretchered off the field.

When the moment had come and only Osmund was left, he triumphantly impaled the ball with his sword to denote victory.”

Yet we must give the English credit for not letting this defeat deter them from adopting the game, and for applying some rules changes to make it more playable. They changed the shape of the field, and they made sure that a match lasts only 90 minutes, that the ball is round and that it has to go into a rectangular goal. They also introduced the half-time break so that the players could enjoy their hot water with a drop of milk, which after the conquest of India became the teatime tea. The invention of the penalty shootout was their only mistake, because they should not have established a rule they obviously can not master.

The English only dispensed with the widduzelas. However, other seafarers brought them to the African continent, where they soon became increasingly popular.

If you, dear reader, want to integrate Catan’s soccer aspect into your game, you can download a soccer field and the corresponding rules (in German) here:

The soccer field in action

Download unter:
http://www.wmc2.net/Spielmaterial/das%20fussballfeld.pdf

As is the case with many variants developed by players, different rules may be applied. Personally, I prefer the following rules, which are slightly different from the rules described in the linked text:

Replace one of the pasture hexes with the soccer field. If the number of the soccer field is rolled, a soccer match takes place between the two players who built a settlement or city at one of the four opposing corners of the field (red circles). Both players roll one die. The high roller receives two sheep from the bank; in case of a tie, each of the two players receives one sheep. If there is only one player with a settlement at a corner, he plays against the bank.

A player who built a settlement at one of the ends of the half-way line may bet one resource card of his choice on one of the two players competing in the soccer match. If the selected player wins the match, the player who placed the bet gets his resource card back and receives one resource of the same type from the bank. In case of a tie, he only gets his resource card back. If the other player wins, his resource is lost.

In the variant with Cities & Knights, you may also bring your fans into play, in the form of knights: if you have one knight adjacent to the soccer field whose number was rolled, you may add their strength to your die roll result. If you are one of the two players competing in the soccer match and are also allowed to bet, you may not bet on your opponent – that’s only possible south of the Alps.

Have fun with this add-on and enjoy the World Cup. And remember: When playing against England, getting to the penalty shootout or giving the English goalkeeper an easy task will suffice to reach the next round.

Dr. Reiner Düren

* The term “soccer” is primarily used in the United States and Canada, while the original term “football” is still used in England and most of the other English-speaking countries.

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