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Catan Only Grow Wheat? No, of Course They Don’T

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Catan Only Grow Wheat? No, of Course They Don’T Rules Story Have you ever wondered if people on Catan only grow wheat? No, of course they don’t. Among other crops, you’ll find beans, maize (aka corn), quinoa, and rice in the fields of Catan. This crop diversity lends strength to the settlers’ nutrition and Catan’s ecosystem. At harvest time, the inhabitants of Catan plant a diverse variety of seeds, “rotating” their harvests in order to replenish the soil, vary their produce, and balance their nutrition. They store seeds to ensure a future of crop diversity and healthy agriculture. It’s a careful but vital balance. Otherwise, some crops might disappear altogether from Catan. Theme What if crop loss threatened Catan? Can you settle Catan without threatening the food supply? We live in an ever more crowded world. Food shortages and famine stress populations in poor and marginal environments. Regional plant losses threaten crop diversity. Catan: Crop Trust™ is an engaging and fun game experience for the family that may lead to thoughtful understanding about the importance of crop diversity to our food supply. Here, we introduce simple, semi-cooperative rules that enliven and educate the Catan® experience. Players must weigh their need to harvest crops against a collective goal to store and preserve seeds in the seed vault. The Crop Trust We developed this scenario in collaboration with the Crop Trust (officially known as the Global Crop Diversity Trust). The Crop Trust is an independent international organization whose goal is to preserve crop diversity in order to protect global food security. Among other things, the organization supports the work of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault to store seeds of some of the world’s most important crops in Svalbard, Norway. If you want to know more about the seed vault and Crop Trust’s work, we recommend that you read the enclosed almanac. For further information, please visit www.croptrust.org. All proceeds of this scenario will be donated to the Crop Trust to support crop conservation work. Have fun playing the Catan: Crop Trust scenario! TABLE OF CONTENTS Game Board Preparation........................... 2 Scenario Components ............................. 3 Game Preparation ................................3 Scenario Rules ...................................4 Catan: Crop Trust Almanac .........................8 Catan: Crop Trust—Rules Game Overview GAME BOARD PREPARATION For your first Catan: Crop Trust™ game, we recommend the set-up shown below. Please note that the desert is not used in this scenario. Instead, you use the additional fields hex included in this scenario (watermarked with a seed vial icon). Add your scenario components (shown below) to those found in your Catan® game. Then, set up as follows. Starting set-up for your first game Robber 8 V 8 6 V 6 V V Extra Fields Hex Crop Token 2 Catan: Crop Trust—Rules Game Components & Preparation SCENARIO COMPONENTS GAME PREPARATION fronts backs GAME COMPONENTS Player Pieces wheat Each player chooses a set of game pieces in one of the available beans 90 Crop Tokens colors. If this is your first game, place your starting settlements and (in 5 diverse crop varieties) roads on the board as shown in the Starting Set-up. After you are The front sides comfortable with the new rules, try the variable setup (see page 7). maize (corn) depict crops. The back sides depict In a 3-player game, set aside the pieces of seed storage vials 1 color. Do not place the starting settlements rice quinoa and roads of this color on the board. Each player receives a Crop Storage Record player aid and places it in front of him/her. backs The Seed Vault & Crop Tokens Place the starting crop tokens on the 41 Event Tokens fields hexes as shown in the “Starting (in 4 different categories) set-up for your first game.” Place the seed vault display beside the 1 Fields Hex game board. Each player places 4 crop (replaces desert) tokens (seed vial side up) of one plant fronts type on one of the 2 seed vault spaces marked in their player color. Red chooses rice, White chooses beans, Orange chooses maize, and Blue chooses quinoa. 1 Number Place all remaining crop tokens beside the board. Token “9” The Robber The robber starts on the pasture hex marked “2”. Starting Resources At the beginning of the game, each player receives the starting resources for the settlement of his/her player color (marked with 4 Crop Storage Records stars V in the starting set-up for your first game). (with build costs and seed storage) Event Tokens Shuffle the event tokens face down (seed vial side up). Each player takes 7 of these tokens and places 1 face-down token under each of the remaining 3 settlements and 4 cities of his/her supply. In addition, place 1 face-down event token each on the special victory point cards “Longest Road” and “Largest Army.” Arrange the remaining event tokens into a face-down supply stack and place it beside the board. 1 Rules Book w/Crop Trust Almanac Seed Vault display 3 Catan: Crop Trust—Rules Scenario Rules SCENARIO RULES This hex has only 2 remaining crop tokens. The next “9” roll will Unlike in the Catan base game, the Catan: Crop Trust scenario definitely force some hard choices specifies the crops depicted by the “grain” card. Here, the fields due to a crop shortage on this field. produce wheat, maize, rice, quinoa, and beans. Hence, for all these crops we use the generic term “food” instead of “grain.” The grain resource cards are called “food cards.” CROP SHORTAGE If someone rolls the number on a fields after harvest Play this scenario according to the standard Catan board game hex and that hex does not contain rules. Apply the following scenario rules, which modify game play. enough crop tokens for all players entitled to harvest the crops produced by that hex, you still harvest food in 1-2 rounds as HARVESTING FOOD normal. Harvesting stops when the hex bears no more crop tokens. If someone rolls the number of a fields hex adjacent to your Should there be no more crop tokens on a fields hex when it is your settlement/city, you may choose to harvest or not to harvest food. To turn to harvest, you cannot harvest. You cannot obtain a food card. harvest food, you remove a crop token of your choice from the fields Now, all the owners of settlements or cities adjacent to this fields hex hex and return it to the supply. After removing a crop token—no can no longer harvest to receive food cards. matter of which type—from a fields hex, take a food card (grain card) from the supply. For a city, you may remove 1-2 crop tokens and accordingly take 1-2 food cards in exchange. ENSURING CROP DIVERSITY Per normal Catan game rules, you must take 1 resource card for Depositing Seeds in the Seed Vault each settlement and 2 resource cards for each city adjacent to a You may store crop tokens—and thus seeds—in the seed vault once terrain hex whose number was rolled. This rule also applies to this during your turn by making a seed deposit. You may only deposit scenario… except for the resource “food” (grain). If someone crop tokens of which there is at least 1 on a fields hex adjacent to rolls the number of a fields hex adjacent to your settlement/city, you one of your settlements or cities (for example: if none of the may choose not to remove a crop token from the field. In this case, fields hexes adjacent to any of your settlements/cities have a rice however, you receive no food card. token, you cannot deposit rice). You make the choice to harvest/not harvest in 1-2 harvest rounds. The robber does not affect the storage of crop tokens in the seed Harvest rounds are conducted in player order, starting with the vault. You may take a crop token from a fields hex and store it in player that rolled the dice (called the “active player”). If the active the seed vault even if that fields hex is being blocked by the robber. player does not have a settlement/city adjacent to the producing If you decide to store crop tokens, follow this 4-step process (you hex, start with the next player in clockwise order entitled to receive must complete each step): production from this hex. During a harvest round, each player who has a right to harvest crops from this hex decides whether to remove 1. Pay the storage costs 1 crop token and take 1 food card in exchange. Each player 2. R ecord the deposit and receive rewards participating in the harvest of crops produced by a fields hex may 3. Store seeds in the seed vault only remove 1 crop token when it is his/her turn to select. 4. R eplant crops in the fields Example: White rolls a “9”. The 1. Pay the Storage Costs player order is White-Red-Blue- First, pay the storage costs by returning Orange. Red, Orange, and Blue are 1 lumber and 1 ore to the supply. Then you on the “9” grain hex. Red is the first proceed as follows: player clockwise from White and Example: Red takes 1 ore card and decides to harvest. She removes 1 lumber card from her hand and 1 wheat crop token from this hex returns them to the card supply. before (returns it to the supply) and harvest Her storage costs are now paid. exchanges it for a food card (takes a grain card from the supply).
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