5 ms·
Settlers of Catan: where friendships are shattered by a well-placed robber
by Jimmc414 4y ago
Settlers of Catan: where friendships are shattered by a well-placed robber
- bee_rider 4y agoIf a friendship can get shattered by a board game, it is good to know that it isn’t really worth getting too invested in ASAP.
- lostlogin 4y agoI wonder how many marriages it’s broken?
- koolba 4y agoA well placed road does more lasting damage.
- Arrath 4y agoOh absolutely
- yamtaddle 4y agoRoad placement can knock one or two players out in the first round or two, on random boards with unfortunate initial placement and four players. Probably the weakest thing about the game—sometimes you pick the best spots available at placement, but are effectively doomed from the start unless other players screw up really badly, and it's that extremely bad kind of losing-early where you're technically still playing but also can't do much. Like, if you want to make other people's experience as bad as yours, you can just give resources to someone to play kingmaker rather than futilely trying to build stuff, which is surely more entertaining than doing nothing, but is also not exactly a positive kind of entertainment. Playing with three mostly fixes it, but then there are fewer people to trade with. Using a set, balanced board layout can help, but IMO gets kinda boring.
- wadadadad 4y agoMy family tends to play with the 5-6 player expansion with only four players, which I think tends to mitigate your mentioned issue somewhat; on the other hand, having that much space also leads to a lot of 'solo play', where you don't need to trade as much as everyone can generally get the resources they need and you're just waiting for the resources. The expansion-with-four-players certainly feels less cut-throat/competitive, for good or bad.
- falsenapkin 4y agoIt's a bit of fun to see the losing position early and become a nuisance. I can't normally role play or act, but catch me knowing I have no recovery in Catan...
- koolba 4y agoMy favorite style of play is to dedicate the entire game to screwing over the one player that has no sense humor. Even at the expense of actually winning the game. The reactions to doing moves that only hurt them, which otherwise have no personal gain and often cost you future opportunity, are absolutely priceless.
- ted_bunny 4y agoHouse rules for balance: - Robber can only target equal or higher VPs - Building a road within 2 lengths of opponent's settlement, and not in equal proximity to yours, induces a toll of one resource.
- andrepd 4y ago> Playing with three mostly fixes it Or with the seafarers expansion! It's an almost perfect expansion to an already excellent game.
- emmelaich 4y agoAre the other expansions any good? I've only played seafarers a few times. Almost exclusively the originals only.
- piva00 4y agoCities & Knights is pretty good too, quite more dynamic, and can combine with Seafarers. Playing with Helpers also modifies the game enough to try more strategies if you are stuck. The "Marianne" helper, for example, can really be a saving grace during a sequence of bad rolls for you.
- mfld 4y agoCities & Knights makes the game richer, absolutely recommended for advanced board game players. I heard that this was actually the original game as he designed it, but the publisher requested a more beginner friendly version, leading to the base game as we know it.
- bee_rider 4y agoI generally see experienced players manage to at least scrape out a mediocre starting spot, no matter how bad their turn is. But new players can pick a bad spot, which is like the worst possibility because it leads to a bad first experience for someone who doesn’t even know how to mitigate it or why their pick was bad (I mean you try to coach them but sometimes people don’t listen, etc).
- tchock23 4y agoI play with a friend who makes it his only goal to divide the map with the longest road. It’s infuriating.
- princevegeta89 4y agoOr by trade deals where trading in one card gets you back five.
- bombcar 4y agoRight-robber is always the correct choice; fight me.
- bokchoi 4y agoI haven't played catan in a long time. What is "right-robber"?
- shagie 4y agohttps://boardgames.stackexchange.com/questions/7097/what-is-optimal-robber-placement-in-settlers https://boardgames.stackexchange.com/questions/7097/what-is-... All other things being equal, the optimal placement of the robber is to impact the person on your right. This makes it longer before the person can retaliate against you (if retaliation is part of the way people play).
- aidenn0 4y agoSometimes a player is just way better placed than anyone else; particularly on a randomized map. Last night my wife was in this situation in a 3-player game and my daughter and I both just toggled the robber between her two best hexes. Ended in a 10-9-8 score (where the 9 could have won earlier had they noticed they could take longest-road rather than building a settlement with the right combination of 3:1 trades).
- bee_rider 4y agoNah, it is an interplay of two factors: who needs to be slowed down the most, and who is most willing to bribe me.
- msluyter 4y agoThis is why I no longer play it -- it also suffers from a severe kingmaker problem. But like others have noted, for me, Settlers was sort of a gateway game that led me into wider world of eurogames and many years of enjoyment & camaraderie with my gaming group.
- chx 4y agoCatan needs a super important kind of meta rule, I refuse to play it without: you can only trade in game items. I had a couple trading dishwashing chores for sheep. No.
- sandyarmstrong 4y agoThe rules are pretty clear that you can only trade resource cards. When they say things like "However, you cannot give away cards, or trade matching resources (“trade” 3 ore for 1 ore, for example)" and "You cannot trade or give away development cards", it's pretty obvious what the intent is.
- bee_rider 4y agoYou can still trade like 8 ore for 1 sheep and a beer though.
- sandyarmstrong 4y agoNo, you can't.
- SkyPuncher 4y agoI have never, ever heard anyone say you can trade anything other than resource cards.
- ipqk 4y agoMy group were very casual gamers and I destroyed the group by making a hail-mary trade. It was my turn and it was clear that one person would win this round if no one won before him. So I made a hail-mary trade with someone else that gave me the slightest chance of winning, but it failed to do so. And of course, that person I made the trade with ended up winning because of my trade. We never played again.
- 2muchcoffeeman 4y agoNever playing because of something like that? I’d argue you guys took it too seriously. I’ve played far more aggressive and complex games where we routinely turn on each other and we just have a laugh and keep playing.
- larkinrichards 4y agoCatan: the only game which has caused me to jump screaming out of a window and run around the house in anger. And then come back and keep playing.