Talk:Settlers of Catan, Strategic considerations

< Talk:Settlers of Catan

Let's get this party started. :-)

Contents

1 Development cards 2 Resources 3 Victory points breakdown 4 Possible counter moves

Development cards

• Would you ever use a Year of Plenty to buy another development card (or two)? ~ stardust 00:34, 16 Dec 2003 (UTC)
  • In some case I know I would. If the game is coming to the end and I see that people have played like 5 and 3 and 1 soldier cards and see that no one probably has any VPs in their hands - I could assume that all the goodies are left in the dev card pack and might give it a shot. But could someone give me exact numbers how many soldier, monopoly, rb, YoP and vp cards the dev card pack has? ~ Karpo Törky
    • See Settlers of Catan#Development cards, hehe. 14,2,2,2,5 in (III-IV) and 20,3,3,3,5 in (V-VI). ~ stardust 16:02, 19 Dec 2003 (UTC)
  • First I have to say that in most circumstances it is better to use the Year of Plenty (YOP) to get resources that you cannot normally obtain from the board. All that I write following is exceptions to this rule (IMHO). It all depends on the context/situation and the strategy that you are set up for in beginning of the game.
    - If you are planning on carding and getting Largest Army (LA) and you don't have enough resources for a city or already have upgraded to cities on the more important spots, then I would consider purchasing another development (dev) card with a YOP.
    - Another possible scenario to consider this purchase is if there is a tight race for LA. That one extra soldier could be the game. As Korpo said above, you must bank on getting another soldier, 14 of 25 of the cards are soldiers in the 3-4-player version, 20 of 34 in the 5-6-player version.
    - One final and desperate reason to make this purchase is if it is obvious that the game will be over before it gets back to your turn and you are at 9 points and have no other way of getting the 10th. Turn in that YOP and hope "luck be a lady tonight" and you pull a Victory Point (VP) card for the game. ~ Falkon

• Which dev card would you most want to pull at the beginning of the game? ~ Falkon 02:02, 17 Dec 2003 (UTC)
  • I tend to trust on ore/wheat/sheep and head for 2:1 port asap. This usually means slow timber and clay gain so probably RB (YoP not too bad either) to get things started. The mighty VP won't help you if you are stuck and not able to build any roads. ~ Karpo Törky 07:12, 17 Dec 2003 (UTC)
    • Uhm... My advice is to not get stuck in any particular mindset, the most popular one being the ore/wheat/sheep mode. (Though if you are going to get stuck in one, that one is probably the best choice.) Eventually you will hit a point where you have to rethink that, in order to advance further as a player. ~ stardust 16:02, 19 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Resources

• What is the most important resource in the game? What is the least? ~ Falkon 02:02, 17 Dec 2003 (UTC)
  • It's totally dependent on your strategy and the stage of the game but generally speaking, I'd call wheat the most important resource. It's needed early in the game for settlements and late for cities. DCs are important throughout. An argument can be made for Ore since there are only 3 ore hexes and much ore is needed in the late game, but wheat has game/strategy wide importance. "Who has wheat?" must be the most common phrase at our games.

As for least important? All are important but Sheep tends to be the most plentiful (5 hexes!) and easy to trade for making them perhaps the least valuable.

With all due respect ;-) I think that is the wrong question to focus upon. Imho, advanced play requires a more macro perspective during the initial placement phase. ~ stardust 16:08, 19 Dec 2003 (UTC)

I completely agree. I do enjoy, though, the forum aspect of gleaning people’s strategies through simple questions. Some of the more simple misconceptions tend to rise to the surface when you probe player's ideas on the balance of the game. Please offer up a question :-) I found it difficult to produce a question that is more macro in nature. I am more of a nitpicker micro type of guy. Hey I think a great idea would be a sample board to analyze. I realize it is only one setup, but it would help to put into example discussed strategies. ~ Falkon 01:41, 20 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Anything that might not be produced a lot. If bricks have the numbers 2, 5 and 12, there will be a shortage of bricks during the game. If you have bricks, and they are in high demand, you can trade them and get several resources in return. Abigail 10:20, Mar 2, 2004 (UTC)

I agree with Abigail that the production chits influence what resources will be in high demand, and I would like to add the availability of good ports. If the board is set up to produce many surplus sheep, and someone takes the sheep port or is positioned to take it early, or if multiple people have 3:1 ports, then a dire shortage of some resource (e.g. clay) will affect the game much less. The reources that will be in high demand further depend on what strategy people are following. If the other three players are all trying for a grain/ore/wool strategy, they might be more willing to bid more freely for your lumber/brick, especially early in the game. Finally I would add the "team spirit" factor. Some games are full of people who hate to give anyone else a good deal and love to embargo. Rather than give you a wheat you need for a lumber they need, they will save and trade 3:1 at their port. In those games you have to plan even at an early strage how crippling the lack of some resource (especially wheat) can be. In other games there are people who will focus more on helping themselves than on hurting other people, and who are more prone to be the one to break an embargo for personal gain. Then one can reason more along the lines of "There's lots of wheat out there, and someone will surely trade it, so I don't have worry as much about producing it myself." --Fritzlein 22:50, 23 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Something nobody has pointed out is that in the majority of games wood will be less valuable than brick. This does not depend on what strategy people are following! Wood and brick are always used together in a one-to-one ratio, except for maritime trade which can dispose of a surplus of one or the other. Therefore whichever of wood or brick is in greater supply is less valuable than the other. (This is not true of, say, ore and wool, whereby ore might be in greater supply than wool and be more valuable anyway.) And since wood has four hexes but brick only three, the wood on average will be in greater suppy than brick, making it less valuable. Of course, the placement of the production chits, ports, and initial settlements may change this calculation, but it is an easy, handy principle to keep in mind. --Fritzlein 22:50, 23 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Victory points breakdown

The second to last answer to the question How many ways can one make change for a ten, with settlements, cities, roads, armies, and victory points? says that you can win the game with 1 city, 5 settlements, the longest road, and a victory point. But that's only 9 points, and short of a win. Now, I could just could just assume the author meant 2 victory points, however, it also talks about owning 7 intersections. But a city and 5 settlements occupy just 6 intersections. Did the author miscount twice? Or is there something deeper going on? Abigail 10:25, Mar 2, 2004 (UTC)

  My math says:
  city      = 2 points
  5 settlem = 5 points
  long road = 2 points
  1 VP      = 1 point
  adding up = 10 points
qute 07:36, 27 Maj, 2004 (GMT +1)

Possible counter moves

There are times when you want to build a settlement in a node, where other player would like to build too. If you dont have enough resources to build a settelment there, then u can build one extra road tword the other player. This way, he cant reach the point, and you have the time to find the needed cards.

Jobu