Tabletop Tuesday - Catan: Seafarers

Welcome to another edition of Tabletop Tuesday - Your weekly exploration into games of dice, cards, luck and more of the Tabletop world.

This week's game...the expansion to the cult classic Eurogame of sheep and wheat, Catan: Seafarers.

(Note: The Settlers of Catan is required to play this expansion.  Click here to learn more about the base game.)

Players: 3-4
Time: 60-120 minutes
Genre: Strategy



Catan: Seafarers is a unique expansion to Settlers that introduces concepts such as open waters, islands, and exploration, and may require a bigger table if you want to expand it to its full size.  Each player receives new ship tokens, which cost one wood and one sheep (which makes the hull and sail).  These ships then act similar to that as roads, but instead are placed along water tiles, expanding players' reaches to new shores.  Additional elements include gold tiles and pirate ships.  Gold tiles are a rare resource tile which when producing resources, grants settlements on that tile one of any resource of their choice (two for cities).  Meanwhile, the pirate ship is the equivalent of the robber, but at sea.  When a seven is rolled, players can now move the robber or the pirate ship, the latter of which still steals from a player's adjacent ships, but since it can't block any resource production on water tiles, it instead blocks ships from moving or being built in its vicinity.

There are also numerous scenarios included which offer a variety setups for more diverse gameplay situations.  And because many of these scenarios require a larger map in which to play through, they typically require more victory points to win, but also offer bonus victory points for settling on new islands outside your starting location so as not to drag too long.  One of my favorite scenarios that really enforces the concept of exploration is the New World scenario.  In this, every tile is randomly put face down other than the player's starting location.  Tiles are then revealed as players expand with roads / ships, and are assigned values as they get flipped.  It may be a little luck based as you're never guaranteed to find land or get good values, but since everyone is in the same boat (no pun intended), it all tends to work out in the end.  And with the trading based economy that is Catan, players can still control the balance of the game through considered negotiations.  This expansion feels right at home with the base version of Catan as many of these concepts had been part of designer Klaus Teuber's original design for Settlers.  I recommend this expansion for those who enjoy large maps and are looking for a little spice and variety to their Catan experience.

If you have any questions about this expansion, let me know in the comments.  And stay tuned to hear more about other Catan expansions and more in future installments of Tabletop Tuesday!