The game is Settlers of Catan, and it takes some initial explanation to understand. I was worried that all the explaining would turn people off, but I decided that I'm just going to get after it and if you read all, you read it all, and if you don't, you don't. I'm not going to get into all the minute details of the rules, but the overview itself is a bit wordy by nature.
Note: there will be screenshots. So at least there are pictures to look at.
A decent nutshell is that it's a combination of Monopoly and Risk. Somewhat. But with bartering. I love the social aspect of it for gifted kids. I noticed this year that my kids struggled working in small groups. There wasn't much give in the give-and-take. Settlers is a board game, but it can also be played online (for free!)
Intro
The players in the game have all landed on the island of Catan. They will spend the game building settlements, roads, and cities, attempting to build a bigger civilization than the other players. Here are the game pieces for each player (each player uses different colors):
Clockwise from the top left: settlements, roads, and cities. Players spend the game collecting and trading for resources of five types: wood, wheat, clay, wool, and ore. Players then use these resources to "activate" one of their game pieces. For example, once play has begun, to build a road, a player must trade in a wood plus a clay resource card to use a road.
Here is the default game board before play has begun (from the online version):
The game begins with each player building two sets of settlements and roads:
As the screenshot states, one of the rules is that settlements must be two hexagon sides away from each other. Once each player has placed their two settlements/roads, play begins. (The placement of these initial settlements is decided by rolling the dice. If there are three players, the highest roll places first and last, the player to the left of the highest roll places second and fifth, the third player places third and fourth.)Probability
This is the first aspect of the game that I see being of a learning benefit to students. Let's take another look at the default map:
Think about two dice. The closer to seven, the higher the probability number has to being rolled. For example, there is only one way to roll a twelve: two sixes. However, there are three ways (six if you count each die independently) to roll an eight. Since settlements are built on the corners of hexes, players want to look for corners where three hexes connect with high probabilities. Let's look at an example of a spot where a player would not want to build:
The spot the arrow points to is at the junction of an eleven, a three, and a ten. There is no worse spot on this example board.Why are our settlement spots so important?
We can finally begin to start discussing gameplay. Each player's turn begins with a roll of the dice. Let's say a six is rolled. Any player who has a settlement on a hex with the number six will receive one resource card of that resource. Our example board:
My color in this game is orange, so I would get one ore resource card. The game continues to move along in this manner with players' turns consisting of a roll of the dice, the passing out of resource cards, bartering and trading, and building.The online game keeps track of the numbers that have been rolled. Take a look at these two screenshots. The first is from the first few minutes of the game, the second from the end.
You can see that by the end of the game, the rolls have aligned to a normal distribution. A perfect opportunity to discuss probability with students.
Social Aspects
I love how the board game forces players who want to win to become social. During a player's turn, that player is allowed to field trade offers and to make offers to other players. Attitude becomes important. Arrogant players who attempt to "do it on their own" will find that in the end, they will be helpless with their trade routes cut off. It is nearly impossible to find a good spot on every resource to begin a game. All players will be left in a situation where they have a deficiency of some resource. Some players use a strategy of hoarding one resource to use as a trade piece.
This social aspect of the game offers students the chance to work in a competitive group. The can learn from the different relationships that are built. For example, I remember playing in a game where every time a six was rolled, I received two wood cards, and another player received two clay cards. As was noted earlier, it takes both a wood and a clay to build a road. Toward the end of that game, the "clay player" and I had an unspoken truce, where every time a six was rolled, we would trade each other one clay for one wood, thereby giving each of us the cards needed to build a road. Near the end, though, I turned him down once, then needed the trade a few rolls later. I had burned the bridge and couldn't make the trade again.
Critical Thinking
Before playing their first piece, players must create a strategy. Perhaps they will attempt to have a monopoly on wood. The player with the longest continual road gets 2 bonus points. Maybe a player will decide this is their strategy.
We haven't talked about cities at all yet. Players can upgrade settlements to cities by trading in three ore cards plus two wheat cards. When a player has a city on the board, they are given two resource cards instead of one when a number is rolled that their city touches. Another strategy is to monopolize the ore, as toward the end of the game, ore becomes extremely important.
Game Over
The game is won when a player reaches ten points. Each settlement on the board is worth one point. Each city is worth two points. Players can earn two more points for having the longest road. There is another aspect of the game I didn't discuss that involves buying "chance-type" cards. These cards can give a player points.
Let's look at a screenshot from just before the online game I played was over:
At this point, I had five points on the board: three settlements and one city. I also had two points in my hand with a longest road card. I ended up building another city and a settlement to win.
Go Get It!
I hope this has shown you the benefits this game can have for kids. Some friends of ours have a fifth grade daughter. It took her multiple times playing the game to catch the hang of it, but now she loves it.
You can buy Settlers of Catan on Amazon.
You can also play for free online at Games.AsoBrain.com. The game is called Xplorers there. I would suggest spectating a few games there before diving in. There is more to the nuances of the game than the overview I've given.
