House rules for Catan-style games, ready to play online

Where it started

The two ideas this whole project was built around. Neither is a number you can change — both need the game to notice something happen and react to it.

• Parallel Road Tax

  Building a road alongside an opponent’s costs the builder 1 victory point. Fires at most twice per game. Needs building.roads.parallel set to allowed or limited.

• Sheep Plague

  When the robber lands on a wool tile, every owner of that tile holding more than 7 cards discards all their wool.

Catch-up

For the table where one bad opening means one player spends an hour watching. These push resources and points back toward whoever is behind.

• Comeback Kid

  Whenever you collect from a roll while 4 or more victory points behind the leader, you collect double.

• Robin Hood

  At the end of every turn the player holding the most cards gives 1 random card to the player holding the fewest.

• Leader’s Burden

  Whoever leads on victory points at the start of a turn must discard on a robber roll at one card fewer than everyone else (6 instead of 7 in classic).

• Underdog Roll

  Once per game, when the player in last place rolls a 2, 3, 11 or 12 they get to roll again. (The reroll is automatic on those totals — the engine cannot yet ask whether you want it.)

Robber variants

Make the robber cost something to use, run out of steam, or reward the player it keeps picking on.

• Robber’s Toll

  Moving the robber costs you 1 random resource, paid to the bank.

• Sabotage

  On a robber roll, a random opponent of the roller also discards half their hand. (The robber still moves and the target is drawn at random — the engine cannot yet skip the robber or let the roller name someone.)

• Seventh Heaven

  Once seven robber numbers have been rolled in the game, the robber is lifted off the board every time it is placed, so it never blocks production again. The roller still steals.

• Thief’s Guild

  Rob the same player twice in a row and your victim draws a free development card.

• Desert Bloom

  Place the robber on the desert three times and it blooms into a grain field with an 8 token. (The engine cannot make a true gold tile mid-game yet, so it becomes grain.)

Economy

Droughts, booms, taxes and tithes. Rules that change what a roll is worth, or what holding cards costs you.

• Drought

  If six rolls go by without an 8, the grain fields dry up and produce nothing until an 8 is rolled.

• Boom Town

  When the same number is rolled twice in a row, every tile it produces pays double. Add “Boom Town: dice memory” too — it remembers the previous roll.

• Boom Town: dice memory

  Remembers the last two roll totals for every player as counters (lastRoll, prevRoll). Required by Boom Town; useful to any rule about consecutive rolls.

• Gold Rush

  Roll a 12 and every player who has ever collected ore takes 1 resource of their choice from the bank. (Until the engine can ask, the card is drawn at random; “touching a mountain” is read as “has collected ore”.)

• Tithe

  At the start of your turn each city costs 1 grain. If you cannot pay for all of them you lose 1 victory point instead. (The engine cannot yet downgrade a city to a settlement.)

• Tax Season

  Every 10th turn, everyone holding 8 or more cards discards 2 at random.

• Snake Eyes Bonus

  Roll a 2 and draw a free development card.

• Banker’s Friend

  Every 10th trade you make with the bank or a port earns you 1 victory point.

Social and trading

Rules about who trades with whom. Reward the dealmaker, reward the hermit, or punish the player nobody will deal with.

• Hermit’s Vow

  Finish the game without ever completing a trade with another player and gain 3 victory points.

• Merchant Prince

  Complete 5 trades with other players and gain 1 victory point. Everyone who gets there earns it.

• Embargo

  Have 3 of your trade offers rejected and you may not trade for 2 turns. (Rejections are counted per offerer, not per pair of players.)

• Forced Generosity

  After a monopoly, the monopolist hands 1 of the named resource back to every other player, routed through the bank.

Aggression and the board

Where you build and who you build next to. Several of these need a relaxed distance setting to mean anything, and say so.

• Road Rage

  When an opponent builds a settlement that cuts your road in two, you steal 1 card from them.

• Blockade

  Every settlement you placed closer than the classic distance costs you 1 random resource at the start of each of your turns. Needs a relaxed distance setting.

• Frontier Bonus

  The first settlement built after setup on the frontier — touching fewer than three producing tiles, so the coast or the desert — scores 1 victory point. (The engine cannot yet tell desert from coast.)

• Crowding Penalty

  From your 4th settlement on, placing one closer to your own buildings than the classic distance costs 1 victory point. Needs a relaxed distanceFromOwn.

• Monopoly Backlash

  Playing Monopoly while holding Largest Army forfeits its 2 victory points. (You keep the title; the engine cannot yet strip an award.)

• Pacifist’s Reward

  Play no knights all game and gain 2 victory points when it ends.

Chaos

Earthquakes, weather and exploding dice. For the night when the standard game has been played enough.

• Earthquake

  Roll a 3 three times in a row and two random number tokens swap places.

• Weather

  At the start of every turn fog rolls over one random resource tile, which produces nothing until the next turn. (The engine cannot yet boost a resource, so the weather is only ever bad.)

• Card Cap

  A hard hand limit of 10: at the end of your turn, anything over 10 cards is discarded at random.

• Wild Dice

  Every roll has a 5% chance to explode: the roller rolls again. Explosions can chain.

Awards

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