Carcassonne

01Discover the game

Carcassonne makes appearance a medieval tiled landscape after tile. You extend roads, build cities and install characters to score points. The whole table uses the same map: a territory started by one person can be enlarged by another, sometimes with an unexpected result.

This chapter concerns the modern base of 72 tiles, with the peasants of the official supplement. The River, the Abbey and the other extensions remain in the box. The new boxes can contain these small modules without forcing them to use them. The overall difficulty is Medium: the placements are simple, but manage its seven characters available, preview the majorities and evaluate the fields demand experience. The game welcomes two to five people, for about 30 to 45 minutes.

02Equipment

The base uses 72 field tiles, including a separate back start tile, a score board and 40 meeples in five colours. Each color has eight meeples: a score marker and seven characters to place. In the modern box described by Z-Man, the 12 River tiles and the five Abbés are additional modules; don't mix them with the 72 tiles here.

The tiles show roads, cities, monasteries and meadows. Small coats of arms in a city increase its score. Gardens appear on some recent tiles: they do not serve in this part without Abbé. No cards, dice and coins are needed.

03The goal

Get the most points by controlling roads, cities, monasteries and fields. The first three can bring back during the game and free their meeples. The peasants stay in the fields until the final countdown: they can bring back a lot, but immobilize part of your reserve.

A territory does not belong to the one who has laid the most tiles. It is the meeples who determine who marks it. So you can complete an adverse city or enlarge a road without having any character; the pose remains useful if it prepares another placement or rids you of a difficult tile.

04Install the landscape

Place the starting tile in the middle of the table, face visible. Mix the other 71 tiles and prepare hidden piles. Each chooses a color, places a meeple on zero of the scoreboard and keeps the other seven in front of it.

The younger one starts with this leaflet, then plays in the clockwise direction. Keep the place around the landscape, as it grows in all directions. To learn, first put examples of roads, cities and fields in front of everyone: a road or a wall can separate two meadows that seem close.

05The three stages of the tour

Laying a tile

Pick a tile and place it by touching at least one side a tile already present. You can turn it. All sides in contact must correspond: road against road, city against city, meadow against meadow. Only one correct match is not enough if another side is inconsistent. A contact by one corner alone does not allow the laying.

You can try several positions before deciding. If there really is no legal place, remove the tile and pick up another one. Collectively check this rare case instead of turning a prohibited location into an improvised variant.

Possible placement of a meeple

After pose, you can place a single meeple of your reserve on the tile you just put down. He becomes a traveller on a road, knight in a city, monk at the monastery or peasant lying in a field. You can also not place anything.

The entire territory chosen must not contain any meeple already installed, even yours and even very far on the map. So look at the whole road or the whole city connected, not only the last tile. In a field, check the borders formed by roads and cities. You never directly pose a second character in an already occupied territory.

However, previously separated territories can be connected later. They can then contain several meeples, of the same person or of several colors. This fusion is legal; it will be used to determine the majority during the score. You never move an old meeple to arrange the result.

Count completed territories

Check all the consequences of the new tile. A road ends at its ends according to the drawing of the board, for example at the crossroads or at the cities, or closes in a loop. It returns one point per tile that composes it. A city is finished when its wall leaves no opening and no hole remains there: it returns two points per tile and two points per coat of arms.

A monastery is finished when it is surrounded by eight tiles: the four sides and the four diagonals. It earns nine points by counting its own tile. Only one new tile can complete several territories, including a monastery located on another tile.

In a road or city occupied by several players, the one who has the most meeples of his color scores all the points. On equal terms for this majority, each player concerned scores the entire total; it is not shared. All the meeples of the finished territory then return to their owner, even those of the players who have not scored. This recovery comes after the optional placement: one cannot immediately reuse the freed meeples to install on the new one. tile.

The peasants

A peasant is laid down to remind him that he does not return during the part. He places himself in a free field of any other peasant already connected. The fields extend by the edges of meadow; a simple diagonal contact is not a fusion. Roads and towns separate the land according to their drawings.

There is no field score when a city closes. At the end only, count the completed cities that border each field. A city counts only once for this field, even if it touches it in several places. Each city earns three points to the majority farmer player; on an equal basis, each receives the total. An unfinished city does not bring anything back to the peasants.

06An example of majority and score

Alice had a knight in a small town; Bob had one in another still separate part. A tile connects them: the big city now contains a red meeple and a blue. This is not a prohibited pose, because no new meeple n , was added in an occupied city; it is the land that has merged.

When this city closes, it occupies four tiles and has two coats of arms. Its value is 4 × 2 + 2 × 2 = 12 points. Red and blue are tied with a meeple each: both earn twelve points and recover their knight. If Bob had managed to join another portion carrying a second blue meeple, he alone would have scored twelve points.

In an independent final field, a peasant touches two finished cities and a city still open. It scores 2 × 3 = 6 points. The number of pre tiles in the field does not multiply by this total.

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07The final count

After laying the last tile and its possible immediate scores, count the unfinished territories. A road is always worth one point per tile. An unfinished city is worth one point per tile and one point per coat of arms, instead of two. An unfinished monastery is worth one point for itself and one point for each neighbouring tile already laid, diagonally understood.

Apply the majorities to the unfinished territories as during the game. Then count the fields, three points per adjacent finished city, giving nothing for the unfinished cities. The player having the highest total wins; a tie at the top is shared. The meeples remaining in reserve do not earn any extra points. If a marker exceeds fifty, note the turn of the track: returning to zero does not lose the fifty points already won.

08Frequent errors

• Connect only one side by forgetting a second incompatible edge.
• Place a meeple on an old tile or in an already occupied city.
• To prohibit a merger of territories on the pretext that it brings together several meeples.
• Share the score between players ex æquo instead of giving it whole to each.
• Count the peasants during the game or recover them after the score of a city.
• Give two points per tile to a city still unfinished to the final count.

09Tips for starting

Keep some meeples available. An immense city is tempting, but it can immobilize your knight for a long time. Small roads and monasteries almost surrounded provide points and quickly return the characters.

Before sleeping a peasant, follow the boundaries of the field with your finger and count the cities that have a good chance of being closed down. Not all your characters are engaged in the meadows from the beginning. Also monitor the opposing territories that you can reach legally from a portion still free.