The expansion adds another dice to the game called an ‘event dice’ – players roll 3 dice instead of 2 each turn. This is represented by a boat that starts on a special game tile off Catan’s shores. Your job is to prepare before they do!Ĭities & knights introduces the mechanic of a barbarian invasion. The barbarian hordes have been watching you closely.

You didn’t think you could build an empire on the Island of Catan without the rest of the world paying close attention did you. In this article, I am going to go through each of these expansions – and rate them from best to worst based on my experience with the game and how each of them changes the core mechanics. It is a game that even today I still break out often during one of our fortnightly game nights. I have played countless rounds of the game and each of its expansions. It is no wonder then that countless expansions have been released over the years to extend, expand, or simply change the way the game is played.Ĭatan for me (like so many others) was the game that got me hooked on board games. The game has maintained its popularity for over 24 years – and has earned its place in the board game hall of fame as one of the best ‘gateway’ games of all time.Ĭatan helped pave the way for modern board game mechanics and was a catalyst for the current ‘golden age of board games’ we are experiencing now. It is a game that anyone who is familiar with board games knows intimately. I recently wrote an article about why Catan is one of the most popular board games of all time.

Catan seafarers extension