Tom Vasel
United States
Homestead
Unspecified
Top 100 Games of all Time
Dice Tower Convention, July 2012!!!!
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(I'm assuming that the reader already knows how to play Settlers of Catan)
Eleven years later, and Settlers of Catan is still going strong. With hundreds of variants, many expansions and spin-offs, it truly is a board gaming sensation. Yet the single complaint that I've heard the most is about the luck involved in the game. Personally, the luck in Catan isn't that big of a deal, but there are occasional times in which I've seen a string of the same number rolled time after time, regardless of the odds. For this, I've preferred a Deck of Dice, even though they do take a bit of fun out of the game - rolling dice is very entertaining for some folk.
Mayfair has now produced their own version of the Deck of Dice, calling them the Catan Event Cards (Mayfair Games, 2006 - Klaus Teuber). It's a deck of thirty-seven cards that replaces the dice rolled in the Settlers game. Thirty-six cards are representative of the thirty-six different combinations that can be rolled with two six-sided dice, along with events that can affect the game.
To add the cards to a Settlers game, five cards are removed from the deck randomly, and a special "New Year" card is placed on top of them, with the other thirty-one cards placed on top of that. Each turn, the top card of this deck is turned over to show the die roll, rather than actually rolling the dice. If there is an event on the card, that event occurs before the number is resolved.
The events are:
- Catan Prospers: Basically, sixteen of the cards have NO event. This is a good thing, in my opinion, because too many events could bog the game down.
- Plentiful Year: Every player gets one resource of their choice.
- Conflict: The player with the Largest Army takes one resource from every player. This is yet another reason to get the Largest Army, and could possibly change the strategy of some players.
- Robber Flees: The robber moves to a desert tile. This is especially useful when playing with the Seafarers expansion, where the robber can often stay in the same spot for many turns.
- Tournament: The player with the most soldiers takes one resource from the bank.
- Trade Advantage: The player with the Longest Road takes one resource card from another player.
- Earthquake: Every player must turn one of their roads sideways, which is damaged and must be "repaired" by the player paying one lumber and one brick; or they can't build anymore roads. This is more of an annoyance than anything else, especially if a player is about to build a new settlement.
- Epidemic: Cities only produce one resource for each hex this turn. Not sure about this card, as it slows the game down slightly. Perhaps a "catch up to the leader" type of card?
- Good Neighbors: Each player gives one resource of their choice to the player on their left. This card I like, as it forces some movement of the cards.
- Calm Seas: The player with the most harbors receives a resource card of their choice.
- Neighborly Assistance: The player with the most victory points gives all players with fewer victory points one resource card each. Again, this is another "catch up" type of card.
Each card also mentions special effects if the Cities and Knights expansion is being used. The cards are about the same size as the resource cards and are easy to handle, with more of the "Catan" style of artwork on them. The rules are included on an extra card, but everything is very self-explanatory.
I've always been a proponent of the Deck of Dice style play in Settlers, because it is a form of controlled randomness, since one never knows what numbers are going to come up; but the spread is more even. Putting the New Year card in, which forces the deck to be reshuffled when it is drawn, keeps players from completely card counting; but a bit of that can still be done. Say, for example, the "12" card (of which there is only one) is drawn first, then you can be assured that it won't be drawn again for at least thirty turns. This may or may not please players, and I've found that most players are split on their opinions of the usage of a Deck of Dice.
The events, on the other hand, are nice, because they are simple and break up the sometimes monotony of a Settlers game. They push the harbors and Largest Army, which gives players more incentive to go for both, which takes some emphasis off the seemingly universal Longest Road envy. I like the deck enough to ask to use it in every game of Settlers I play (including Simply Catan and Settlers of Canaan) but will defer if someone really wants to use dice. I do wish that the deck was more fully compatible with Starfarers of Catan, my favorite version of Settlers; as the events don't really work.
The game also comes with several scoring cards (with advertisements for other Mayfair Games on their reverse) that can be used, along with some tokens, to keep track of players' points. Really, I never thought this to be a problem in Settlers games, and using tokens and the cards almost is more trouble than it's worth. I do suspect that some people will enjoy them, and it does give you a little more value for price of the deck (currently $5).
My overall opinion is that the Catan Event Deck is not a necessary addition to a Settlers game, but it does provide a useful tool for those who hate rolling dice. It's better than a generic Deck of Dice, because of the Catan specific events; but those can be ignored so that the deck can be used with another game. However, since I only really pushed for the Deck of Dice to be used in Catan games, the Catan Event Deck is superior and will see play often in our games. It's a nice addition and adds a small bit of variety without making any drastic changes. And you'll finally stop hearing one player complain about the fact that a "6" is never being rolled!
Tom Vasel
"Real men play board games"
www.tomvasel.com
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Simon Hilsdorf
Germany
Mannheim
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Hey Tom,
do you have any informations about an error of the numbers of cards - if i remember correct the german deck had one more 11 and was missing another number - i wonder if they fixed that in the us edition.
A broken probability is even more worse then bad luck 
Ciao,
Simon
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Tom Vasel
United States
Homestead
Unspecified
Top 100 Games of all Time
Dice Tower Convention, July 2012!!!!
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The probability looks okay to me!
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Grzegorz Kobiela
Germany
Hanover
Lower Saxony
Stalker!!!
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If you have enough decks of those cards (1 for each player) you might try a variant of mine:
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Give each player one deck of 36 event cards (no "New Year" needed in entire game). Let each player shuffle his/her deck of cards and flip over the card on the top. The player with the highest number becomes start player (resolve ties by flipping over more cards).
Build your initial settlements and cities. Then reshuffle your decks. Now let everyone take 3 cards from the top of his/her event deck. If it's your turn you have two options:
* Either play an event card from your hand;
* Or alternatively flip one over from your deck.
In either case this number will be "rolled" for everybody and its event resolved. Ignore earthquakes. Afterwards role symbol die and red die.
At the end of your turn take a card from your event deck if you played one from your hand (have always 3 event cards in your hand at the end of your turn). It is obvious that event cards do not count to the hand limit of 7 (+ city walls) and cannot be stolen.
Place all played cards face-up next to your event deck. If your event deck should ever run out of cards, reshuffle the face-up cards tile and place it face-down to be your new event deck. Normally, this situation should never take place (this would mean you have to play 36 times # of players turns!).
Special rule (Alchemist)
If you play Alchemist, you have two options:
* Either take one card from the played cards tile and discard one from your hand instead;
* Or search one from your event deck, take it, and put one from your hand back into your event deck. Afterwards reshuffle it.
This makes Alchemist a bit weaker cause you always have a choice of three numbers and a forth unknown one (card on the top of event deck). Nevertheless, it is good to 'recycle' cards or search for them.
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I hope you like this idea. It takes away another luck factor, because although the distribution of event cards matches probabilities, it is important which numbers come first. Here you have a great influence on which numbers will be rolled on your turn, so everyone has the same chances from the beginning.
Of course, I see the weak points of my idea: Some numbers will perhaps never be chosen (e.g. 2 and 12). On the other hand you have the control, when it'll come (if you draw it from your event deck). I will try this next time I play settlers. Post your comments and suggestions. I'm curious how much you'll like or dislike this idea.
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Bob Marso
United States
Oregon
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Does the event deck include a reshuffle card?
I hope so. That would help eliminate the card counting element
and still keep a bit of random fun for me.
Bob
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Tom Vasel
United States
Homestead
Unspecified
Top 100 Games of all Time
Dice Tower Convention, July 2012!!!!
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It does. The "New Year" card causes the deck to be reshuffled, so while the percentages stay close to the same, nothing is guaranteed.
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Brian Cherry
Canada
North Bay
Ontario
Obligitory Smart-Ass Comment Here
Shhhhhhhh!
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Hi,
Thanks for the review. I was wondering about these. I guess (from looking at the pictures of the cards) that the event die is still needed (for barbarians and progress cards). So if a roll is still necessary, isn't it more cumbersome to have 2 steps instead of just 1 die roll?
Jugg
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Kevin Bourrillion
United States
Mountain View
CA
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TomVasel wrote: Say, for example, the "12" card (of which there is only one) is drawn first, then you can be assured that it won't be drawn again for at least thirty turns. This may or may not please players, and I've found that most players are split on their opinions of the usage of a Deck of Dice.
It should be pointed out that the level of wild randomness vs. predictability can be very easily tuned to whatever level the group prefers, simply by adjusting the position of that New Year card in the deck.
If you put it almost at the bottom, you have supreme card-countability. If you put it second from the top, you have exactly the same situation as with dice (except one hell of a lot of shuffling!). Put it wherever in between makes you feel warm and fuzzy -- or just shuffle it in randomly along with everything else!
I really want this deck, but personally I am not planning on using the Earthquake, Conflict or Epidemic events, as I don't think the game really needs to be slowed down.
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United States
Swarthmore
Pennsylvania
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Ponton:
I wonder if you could achieve a similar level of control without having to buy additional decks by using a card draft. For example:
At the beginning of the game, turn three event cards face up to a draw area. Each turn, a player selects and plays one of them, and then adds another card to the draw area from the deck. If a New Year card is drawn, the player discards the other two cards, reshuffles the deck, and refreshes the draw area with three new cards for the next player.
This way, if nobody wants an earthquake, it will linger on the table until someone finally decides to use it or a New Year card is drawn.
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