Carcassonne Board Game

Basic Meeple Strategy

The basic game of Carcassonne is played with a single starting tile and 71 randomly drawn tiles. The steps that each player can perform each turn are: 1. Place a tile, 2. Place a meeple and 3. Score a feature. If you are playing the game with only 2 players, you will have to make 35 moves, but each player only has 7 meeples. Even with the maximum of 5 players, you will still have to opertunity to place 14 meeples with only 7 meeples in your stack.

Plus Expansions

Meeple Management quickly becomes a huge part of the game, and this becomes even more critical with each game expansion that you include!

The River replaces the single starting tile with 12 River tiles. More tiles with the same 7 meeples!

The Farmer is an option that allows you to claim the fields between the roads, cities, river, and edges of the map, but when you place a meeple as a farmer it has to stay on the board until the end of the game.

Just in case things weren't confusing enough already.

The Abbot is a specialized meeple for monasteries and gardens. "Gardens?" the garden is a symbol that appear on 8 of the Basic Game's 72 tiles plus 1 River tile.

When placing a tile with a monastery or garden, you may place your abbot onto the monastery or onto the garden. You may, of course, place a regular meeple onto the monastery, or other features, such as roads, etc. You may not place a regular meeple onto the garden.

When the monastery or garden occupied by your abbot is surrounded by eight tiles, you score 9 points (just like a regular monastery scoring) and you get your Meeple or Abbot back.

On your turn, if you do not place a meeple during the 2. Placing a meeple phase, you may instead return your already-placed abbot to your supply, even if it is not yet surreounded by eight tiles. If you do so, you score immediately as many points as the garden or monastery your abbot occupied is worth at that time, exactly like how monasteries are scored during the final scoring.

Other Expansions

Inns and Cathedrals

This expansion adds 18 additional landscape tiles. 6 of the tiles display an Inn beside the road which enhances the road scoring from 1 point per tile to 2 points per tile, and 2 tiles that display a Cathedral inside a city which enhances the city scoring from 2 points per tile and coat of arms to 3 points per tile and coat of arms.

This expansion also includes one additional "Large Meeple" which counts as two meeples when determining which player has the majority of meeples on a feature.

Traders and Builders

This expansion adds 20 goods tokens and 24 additional landscape tiles including 9 with Wine, 6 with Corn, and 5 with Cloth symbols matching the goods tokens.

The goods tokens throws a bit of a twist into Meeple Management! During final scoring, the player who has collected the most of each type of goods token (Wine, Grain, or Cloth) is awarded 10 points. In the case of a tie for a type, each tied player receives 10 points. It is normally the job of the individual who has their meeple on a city to place the closing meeple on the city to score the points and get their meeple back. But, the player who closes a city that contains trader symbols is the player who then gets the matching goods tokens.

There is a definate advantage to be the player who closes a city, even if you are not the player who will get the points when it is closed! The builder is a special figure that belongs to each player. Instead of placing a meeple, you may place your builder on the tile you just placed, but only on a road or city that you already have one meeple on. Then, if you place a tile that continues the road or city that your builder occupies, you may immediately draw and place another tile.

Instead of placing a meeple, you may place your pig on the field segment of a tile you just placed. However, that field must also contain at least one of your farmer meeples. At the end of the game, you receive 4 points (instead of 3 points) for each completed city touching the field with your pig.

Flying Machines

This expansion includes 8 tiles. Instead of placing a meeple on the road, garden, or fields on these tiles, you can place your meeple directly on the Flying Machine image, then role the die and move your meeple 1, 2, or 3 tiles in the direction of the Flier.

Crop Circles

This expansion includes 6 Crop Circle tiles that allow a player to force everyone to either add or remove a meeple from a City, Road, or Farm that they already have meeples on.

Ferries

This expansion includes 8 Lake Tiles that terminate 3 or 4 road segments on each tile and 8 small Wooden Ferries that allow a player to connect 2 of the road segments when the lake tile is placed. Additional rules allow other players to realign the Ferries when road segments are expanded.

Abbey and Mayor

The Abbey and Mayor expansion has a strong influence on Meeple Management. The expansion includes 12 new landscape tiles, plus each player gets 1 Abbey tile, 1 Mayor meeple, 1 Barn meeple, and 1 Wagon meeple.

The Abbey tile can be used to eliminate the Meeple Trapping example. Instead of drawing and placing a Land tile, place your Abbey tile on the impossible square. An abbey may only be placed in an empty space surrounded on its 4 orthogonally adjacent sides. In other words, the abbey may only be used to fill a hole, and the 4 adjacent tiles (fields, roads, cities) does not matter; the abbey always fits.

The Mayor is a very special meeple. It is placed on a city just like a regular meeple. The difference comes when the city is scored: Each regular meeple has a strength of 1. Each large meeple has a strength of 2. Each mayor has a strength equal to the number of coats of arms in the city. If there are no coats of arms, the mayor has a strength of 0.

The Barn is a Meeple that scores Farms in the middle of the game and returns the farmers back to their stacks. Barns can be joined, but not stolen, and they are then scored a little higher than farms at the end of the game.

The Wagon acts like a normal meeple, but, after scoring, it can be moved to an adjacent unoccupied / incomplete feature instead of being returned to your stack!

Bridges, Castles and Bazaars

Bridges allow players to add road segments to their tiles, which also allow for the field under the bridge to connect the farms on both sides of the road.

Castles that score points for neighboring completed features

Bazaars that allow players to big on the tiles they want to play.

Halflings

A Halfling only has to match two sides when it is placed in a square open space. This can be extremely important when you are trying to complete features that have been blocked by your opponents. All of the Halfling I tiles have a diagonal field edge. The diagonal edges of the Halfling II tiles also contain roads and cities.

River II

The River II expansion added to Count, King and Robber includes a river fork tile. It should be set aside along with the source and lake tiles. The fork tile is to be placed first before the first player takes a random tile.

Princess and Dragon

This expansion include two meeples, a Dragon who wakes up randomly during the game and eats the meeples who are close to it and the Fairy who can protect one of the meeples from the Dragon. It also includes 30 tiles that removes meeples from cities, start the dragon moving, change where the dragon starts, and randomly let you place your meeple anywhere on the board.