The following variants are highly recommended: The likelihood of receiving better trade offers increases, and the robber avoids your terrain hexes. The less you trade, the more advantages you are giving away.Ī little bit of complaining at the right time often works wonders. Trading with an opponent gives you and your opponent an advantage over the other players. If you trade cleverly, you improve your chances to win the game. Then you can trade 2 wool for any 1 other resource of your choice. Harbors are of particular importance if you can expect a good production of a particular resource.įor example, if you have settlements adjacent to pasture hexes marked with good numbers, you should, as soon as possible, build a settlement on a coastal intersection next to the 2:1 wool harbor. For example, owning a settlement adjacent to two terrain hexes marked with a 6 and an 8, respectively, is more favorable than owning a settlement adjacent to two terrain hexes each of which is marked with an 8. This is the only way to receive as many different resources as possible, thus avoiding expensive trades with the bank.Ī broad distribution of numbers is also beneficial. You should make sure that your first two settlements are adjacent to all terrain types if possible. Therefore, at least at the beginning of the game you should build settlements adjacent to terrain hexes marked with numbers close to 7. This shows that the closer the numbers are to 7, the more frequently they are rolled. If you roll 2 dice 36 times, the statistical distribution of the results is as follows: I'll also give you a description of two variants I like to play.ġ. I wrote down a couple of tips for you, so you can avoid having a similar experience. As you can imagine, I hardly received any resources for the settlement I had placed between terrain hexes marked with the numbers 2, 12, and 3. Well, nobody had told me that with two dice the numbers 6 and 8 are rolled much more frequently than the numbers 2 and 12.

I lost my first game of CATAN resoundingly.

Settlers of catan expansion