Carcassonne Builders and Traders is the second expansion that we purchased for the core Carcassonne game, which has seen lots of play time at our table. This set features a few changes that can really open up the game to new strategic possibilities by adding to the scoring possibilities, as well as a minor modification to the play method.

Included in the set are 24 new land tiles, 20 of which contain emblems for one of three goods – wine, wheat, and cloth. There are also 20 goods tokens to correspond to those tiles. Many tiles feature odd shaped land pieces or features that were not previously available. They’re nothing earth-shattering, but they make for a more interesting map. There are two new followers – one builder and one pig – for each of the six colors. Also included is a cloth bag from which you can draw tiles. The bag is a bit smaller than I’d hoped, but big enough to fit the 114 non-river tiles that we currently have with enough room for another expansion or two.

The builders represent the only real change to the game mechanics. After you’ve claimed a city or road using one of your regular followers, when you are adding another tile to it you may place the builder on it. On every subsequent turn where you add to that city (or road) you may take one extra tile and immediately place it anywhere on the map where it fits. In short, you get a second turn. Once the road or city is completed, the builder is taken back and can be re-used on another city or road. On a recent game, I played the builder onto the second tile in the first city that I claimed…and because the city got ‘boxed in’ by other players, it was NEVER completed…talk about the waste of a good builder!

On the other hand, the pig is simply a new scoring mechanism. It’s inclusion does little to enhance the game, but also does not detract from it. You may place your pig on any farm tile that you are adding to a farm that you already own. When scoring farmland at the end of the game, any cities that use the farm with the pig that you would normally score four points for will instead be worth five points. The pig itself does not count as an extra farmer, and is ignored when counting determining ownership of the farm. And because you can only place the pig on the tile that you are currently laying down means that you can’t simply wait until the end of the game to place him on your most lucrative area. .

There are no ‘traders’ per se, but the new goods tiles turn Carcassonne into a trading mecca. Tiles that contain a goods emblem are placed just as any other city tiles. However, when a city containing one or more goods emblems is completed, the person placing the tile that completes the city may take a goods token for each emblem in the city, irregardless of who owns the city. At the end of the game, 10 points are awarded to the person with the most wine, 10 points for the most wheat, and 10 points for the most cloth. These points can really come in handy. During a recent game, I was trounced on farmlands by my daughter, but the 30 points I scored on goods gave me a 9 point victory!

Carcassonne, thanks to the expansions, no longer plays in less than 45 minutes. Instead of 72 tiles, we now play with 126, so the games are noticeably longer. But the added strategy of the expansions – especially Builders and Traders – adds depth to the game that it originally lacked. Prior to the goods tiles this expansion, there was little reason to finish another player’s city, and the bonus points for those goods at the end of the game can really add up. Placing the builder wisely can give you a great advantage with the additional turns it can provide, but if the city or road gets bogged down and is difficult to complete, the builder is stuck there. The pig is the least revolutionary (and least beneficial) of the new additions, but even he can come in quite handy in a close game. I highly recommend Builders and Traders. While the Inns and Cathedrals earned its’ keep partly from adding a sixth player and 50/100 tiles, B&T focuses more on strategic additions to gameplay, and it works quite nicely.