Settlers of Catan: Online Game to Play with Friends

Each evening, you will find my friends and I contemplating maps like the one shown below. We're looking for the best positions; the most valuable ports; the most cunning places in which to drop our roads.

In short, we're trying to build our mini-empires without being thwarted, and in such a way that our fellows have to bow down to us.

Four different players are represented on the above Settlers of Catan map. Jelmer won. The settlements, cities and road in blue utterly obliterated any chance that the rest of us had of expanding. You can see our puny efforts in red, white and orange.

With the right kind of eyes, you can also identify the bitter battle, that took place before Jelmer made it to ten points, thus winning the game.

Down at the bottom, Jethraw's road - in orange - cut straight across mine in white. I couldn't build onto the port to gain an advantage there. Jelmer (blue) and Robin (red) then hemmed me in, stopping me spreading in any other direction.

But it was quid pro quo. My white settlement on the grain port prevented Robin from building the same.

The final desperate struggle to stop Jelmer winning can also be seen in the center of the board. That group of people, positioned on the 11, were there to rob him two-fold. The player who placed them there was able to steal resources from Jelmer's inventory, and as long as the robbers remained on that spot, he was unable to draw grain to replenish his stock.

Settlers of Catan is all about tactics, and colonizing the most precious positions on the map. May the best gamer win!

In setting up a game, all players are invited to built two settlements, each with a road attached. Their placements become the foundation for an empire, hence their positions are chosen with care, and with all due regard to the resources around them.

Clay and wood are the most important materials at the outset of the game. They are needed to build roads in order to expand. They are also half of the resources necessary to create settlements - the other two are grain and wool - hence they are doubly in demand at the outset.

Your road can be intercepted by another player, until it has a settlement upon it. Roads can cut up other roads, but can't cut through a settlement.

In addition, no other settlement may be built on a neighboring spot. It dominates the whole area.

While playing Settlers of Catan, you will spend a great deal of time wishing that you had one resource or another. Perhaps an extra clay to make a road, or one more ore to construct a city.

But you can make your excess materials work for you to achieve your goals.

Players may trade with each other, when it's their turn. I might swop my wool for a grain, or hold a special offer - two wood and a clay for just one wool, please! Your friends may oblige or laugh in your face, depending upon how close you are to beating them.

If it's the latter, then all is not lost. Players with four items of the same kind may trade with the bank. While the deal is guaranteed, it's very one-sided. The bank will only provide one material in exchange for your four.  That's interest in action.

However, there is a way to get a better exchange rate - colonize a port!

All around the Catan map are tiny islands. By placing a settlement upon an anchor spot, you get to utilize the port beside it.

The majority are 3:1 ports. As the name suggests, this allow you to swop three of the same material for one in return. Hence the bank will only ask for three wool in exchange for one grain, instead of the usual four.

Even more valuable are the bespoke ports dotted between. There's one for each resource. If you can grab one of them, then you only need two of that material in order to swop it for another.

Development cards are your secret arsenal in Settlers of Catan. You buy them from the build screen, using up an ore, wool and grain apiece.

You can't choose what card you draw (it's a little like the Chance cards in Monopoly in that respect). But you can keep them safely hidden, until the optimum time for deployment.

A clever use of development cards can easily win a game. I have a friend who's particularly good at judging the right moment. We all worry when we know he has a card in his inventory.

There are five cards to use to your advantage in Catan:

• Victory Point. This awards the player a secret point, invisible to all of the other players. If you can collect ten victory cards, you've automatically won the game!
• Knight. You may use this to remove robbers from one resource and place it on another. It's perfect for freeing up one of your own squares, if another player has blocked it with robbers. But it can also be utilized aggressively. If you know that an opponent has a certain resource, yet they refuse to trade, then you can attempt to steal it. Just draw your knight and move the robbers to one of their resource spots!  Also worth noting is that you can gain a point for having the largest army, if you've used a knight card more than any other player.
• Monopoly.  Play this to automatically drain every other player's inventory of your chosen resource. You get the entire bounty to yourself.
• Inventory. This card is used to create two materials of your choice. It can be a pair of the same, or two different resources.
• Road-Builder. Without any materials at all, this Catan development card will allow you to construct two roads.  Brilliant for getting somewhere fast, or quickly cutting off an opponent's prospective route.

There is a lot of room for different gaming styles in Settlers of Catan, and a great deal of scope for tactical playing, particularly when you're pulling out development cards. Which is why it's so utterly compelling!

Presumably by now, you can see why my friends and I have fallen in love with this game. Enjoy your own explorations into the world of Catan.