Objective

Get resources to buy various buildings and development cards, and try to be the first player to reach 10 points (or 13 in case of City & Knights)

Setup

• The board consists of hills (brick), forest (lumber), mountains (ore), fields (grain), pasture (wool) and a desert (nothing) at random places.
• Each terrain except the desert has a number of 2-12 on it. The desert starts with the robber on it.
• Each player places 2 settlements and 1 road next to each settlement on the board, then they receive resources for each terrain around the second settlement.

Gameplay

Rolling for resource production (obligatory): On your turn, roll 2 dice and calculate the sum.

• The terrains with that number produce resources for all players who have settlements or cities next to them (if the robber isn't blocking them): 1 resource per settlement and 2 per city.
• If you roll a 7, no one gets any resources and players with 8 resources or more must discard half of them (rounded down). You must move the robber to a new terrain and steal 1 random resource from a player who has a settlement or city next to that terrain.

Trading (optional): during your turn you can trade resources

• with all other players (domestic trade)
• with the bank (maritime trade) at the standard rate of 4 identical resources for 1 or at a preferential rate of a harbour if you have a settlement next to it.

Building (optional): finally, you can build roads and settlements, upgrade settlements to cities or purchase a development card by paying the resources needed.

• Roads must connect to the initial settlements and cost 1 brick + 1 lumber (worth 0 points)
• Settlements must be connected by roads to existing settlements (except at start) and cost 1 brick + 1 lumber + 1 wool + 1 grain (worth 1 point)
• Cities replace an existing settlement and cost 3 ore + 2 grain (worth 2 points)
• Development cards (unavailable in Cities & Knights) cost 1 ore + 1 wool + 1 grain and include
  • 14 Knight cards that allow to move the robber to another terrain and steal a resource
  • 2 Road Building cards allowing extra roads to be built
  • 2 Year of Plenty cards providing two free resources of choice
  • 2 Monopoly cards giving all other players that help gathering resources or building road•s
  • 5 Victory Point cards

You can play a development card at any time during your turn, even before rolling the dice, as long as it was bought on a previous turn and is not a victory card.

Scoring

• Settlements: each is worth 1 victory point.
• Cities: each is worth 2 victory points (1 Point from the settlement + 1).
• Victory Point cards: some development cards are worth 1 victory point. They are kept hidden until you have sufficent points to win.
• Largest Army: the player who has played the most knight cards at any time (at least 3) gets the largest army card which is worth 2 points. No largest army in C&K.
• Longest Road: the player with the longest continuous road at any time (at least 5 segments) gets the longest road card which is worth 2 points.

If there is a tie, the original owner keeps the achievement cards.

End of Game

If a player has 10 or more victory points during their turn (including victory points cards), they reveal them and the game ends with their victory. For Catan Cities & Knights, a player needs 13 or more victory points to win.

Variants

• Easy Start: Players reroll any 7s they obtain in their first 2 turns. With the Cities & Knights expansion, the event dice is not rolled during these turns as well.
• Friendly Robber (Base Game only): The robber may not move to a terrain that is adjacent to a settlement of a player with only 2 victory points. If there is no valid terrain, the robber moves to the desert and the resource card cannot be taken from such players.

Cities & Knights

Event Dice

• An additional event dice is rolled each turn.
  • If it shows a ship (3 faces), the barbarian ship moves 1 space closer to Catan. If it reaches the last space (7th), the barbarians attack.
  • If it shows a city gate (blue/green/yellow), players draw a progress card if the color of the gate and the red dice match their chart.
• Each player can have up to 4 Progress Cards at a time. Victory Point cards are immediately played and do not count. Others can be played similar to Development cards.
• When the barbarians attack, they have 1 strength per city/metropolis owned by all players; The defending army have strength equal to the value of all active knights.
  • If the barbarians are stronger, they pillage a city of the player with the lowest value of active knights, reducing it to a settlement. This also destroys any city walls under it.
  • If the defending army is equal or stronger, the player with the highest value of active knights (non-tied) gains a "Defender of Catan" victory point card, which is worth 1 victory point. If there is a tie, the tied players gain a progress card each instead.
  • Regardless of the result, the barbarian ship is reset and all knights become inactive.

Cities

• When a city produces wool/lumber/ore, replaces a resource they produce with a commodity (cloth/paper/coin) instead.
• Two new items can be built:
  • City Walls must be under an existing city without one and cost 2 brick (worth 0 points). A player can have at most 3 city walls, and each increases the maximum number of cards they can safely hold when a 7 is rolled by 2.
  • Knights must be connected by roads and cost 1 wool + 1 ore (worth 0 points). They start inactive at value 1, but they can be promoted with 1 wool + 1 ore (+1 value, up to 2) or activated with 1 grain.
• Active Knights may perform 1 action on your turn regardless of strength. This can be moving it along your roads to another intersection, moving it onto a weaker opponent knight (forcing it to move or removing it), or chasing away a robber adjacent to it (as per playing a knight). They become inactive afterwards.
• Cities can be developed in trade (yellow)/politics (blue)/or science (green) by paying 1 cloth/paper/coin per improvement level.
  • The 3rd improvement provides a power each: trade 2 of the same commodity for a resource once per turn (trade); may promote knights to value 3 (politics); take any resource if no resources are gained and no robbers (green).
  • The first player who reach the 4th improvement in each area may place a Metropolis on a city. They are worth 4 victory points each and are immune to barbarians.

Variants

• Nasty Battles: When the barbarians land, starting from the active player, each player declares the amount of their own active knights they would commit to defending Catan.
• Knight Errant: Before rolling the dice, a player may use an active knight to chase away the robber, as per playing a knight in base Catan.