I'm going to make a decision and actually go against the consensus of pick number 6 (2nd settlement for blue at 7:00). If I could make changes, for blue I would actually place on the 6/9/2 instead of the 8/3/4. The reasoning for this is to get more resource diversity. By placing on the 8/3/4 you heavily rely on the 6 ore to roll, and as the gray and purple player, I will always choose to block that spot. I think this makes for a very difficult game for blue if they place on 8/3/4. About number diversity, I do think to double up on 6 is bad, but I think it rolls a bit too often for you to get "unlucky" and not have many 6's in a game. On the other hand, coordinating complimenting resources (wood/brick and ore/wheat) in the same roll is quite nice and prevents you from burning cards to the robber since you can use them on your turn. In this case, the ore and wheat are both on the 6's. This is useful for getting cities quickly since ore and wheat come at the same time. In addition, this gives blue a bit more road building potential (9 wood) which is very nice.
I'm a much less experienced casual player so please correct me if my reasoning is flawed, but walking through the exercise (I ended up making every choice the same as in the video with the exception of third position's 2nd settlement, where I chose the 6/9/2 instead of the 8/4/3), my rationale for the 6/9/2 settlement was that, if you take the 8/4/3 then grey takes the 6/9/2 and gets their strong setup with easy access to the wood port to make up for their lack of sheep and has enough wood and brick to be versatile in their game plan, but if you take the 6/9/2 you force them to take the 8/4/3 where they're more likely to be flooded with wheat/sheep they can't utilize as well with their limited ore production, and no relevant 2:1 ports to access to make up for that imbalance in the late game when no one is willing to trade. You still get a strong start, but one of your opponents' starts is arguably weaker; isn't that a better scenario?
I'm agreeing here too, and while I'm not a pro, I was thinking the 6,9,2 for same reason above of using a critical spot from my opponent (didn't consider flooding my opponent's hand though)
Just started playing, so I apologise for the ignorance. Why not the 9, 10, 2? You would point your road left, get the resources you are lacking, and most likely have the 6 wheat to yourself? Unless someone takes the 6, 9 dessert?
The build paths and priorities definitely helped me a lot. I'm getting better at deciding where to place settlements, but it's still so hard for me to picture where I could expand in the future. Thanks for stating everything so clearly, and also for the clear visuals on the board. It makes such a complicated game feel easy to understand!
loved that video. Its one of the first catan videos I watched and it dealt with exactly the problematic I was looking for. Can't wait to get onto steam and play some catan! Thank you for the content! Keep going! And hopefully our paths never cross ingame!
Love all your videos, this one was especially good. I like the format, hope you do more like this where we think through every players initial setup and priorities
Wonderful video, I got almost every settlement position right but I really did not think about build paths and priorities. That was a great section of the video, I learned a lot!
You’re the MVP!!! I‘m watching your videos since 3 days now and I won every single game, or got at least 2nd place 😍 You 100% create the Videos I was looking for 🤤
Great videos man. Really have learned a lot from your analysis and insight! I had a thought here as 4th player that I was hoping you could shed some light on. With the other three players really needing wheat desperately, what are your thoughts of P4 going on the 8-5-10 and the 6-9-2? You pretty much lock up the wheat and wood port which you can use for sheep/ore. You should absolutely be competitive for long road with ability to connect too. At the same time, you really hinder other players' strategies. Player 1/2 will be forced to settle for less reliable wheat, which will absolutely help you out. Interested to hear your thoughts!
Great video. I found myself choosing differently in each scenario for different reasons. First position 956 might be best, but i think another strong play is to get the 854 and point the road down to get the 8T and locking off the west side of the map to myself, knowing that I should be able to get a 6 with my second settlement. (I weight heavily on number diversification on my decisions if I can help it). Second position I'd get 695 (these 2 can go in either order). I'd point the road to the left hoping for the 9T Third I'd get 85T with the road pointing towards the wheat port knowing that I'm guaranteed the 692 as my next settlement getting massive wheat to go with my port and good road production. Fourth and fifth has to get 843 and 6311 for a nice development card game. Point the roads towards the coast Sixth I'd get 692 as planned and point the road towards the wood port 7th I'm picking the 9411 denying red the other good position. 8th I think is stuck taking the 6 wood port. But This isn't that bad a scenario because you will have great wood production and good expansion opportunities to get the 8T as planned, then 43 and 83 and play for the longest road.
Hey, great video! Enjoyed the reasoning behind each pick. I wondered if you considered the 6-2-9 for Purple's 2nd placement as they have the same wood advantage as grey and also potential access to the wheat port. Brick should be aplenty on the board to trade for. But also importantly it puts grey in a very difficult position (assuming blue's plan doesn't change) as he needs the wheat so is pretty forced onto the 8-5-10. It's possibly more of a gamble (reducing spread of resource) but does diversify numbers to counter. Maybe I'm just a risk junky!
defintely learned something. watching your other matches, i was able to guess the majority of these. but they were guesses though. but its like you said, theres no correct place, only most viable.
Nice work! It'd be cool for you to play the game out with 3 other players and then show who won and whether their strategy changed throughout the game.
Hahaha! Actually, we ended up playing on this board! Neonate won! As I said, I believe the other 2 players are a lot more skilled and experienced than I am.
i think u need to build the 4th Settlement on the 5/10/8 and then the 5th on the 3/4/8 so you will get ore first because its more importent and rare for you.
Thank you for this; very helpful. Looking at that second blue pick: you are ignoring the 9/10/11 spot completely; I guess the rationale being that wheat production takes priority over having access to road building via wood/brick? Picking up on other comments, for second blue pick, if you went for the 4/5/11 spot then this neutralises the 5 brick roll of the dice since all 4 players now have this; would that matter?
Taking the best ore along with a twinge of wheat is a lot better than getting wood/brick. Second question: Yes it would matter because then everyone at the same time would need wood. It makes it hard to trade brick.
The priorities part was interesting, but is it useful? Like if you get a bunch of settlement resources, you're going to do all that work to trade them, probably losing some value & time, to get the city instead? It's good to know which settlement you'd (1) build or (2) upgrade first if you had appropriate resources, but I feel like that's as far as it goes.
Great video once again. Agreed with all placement although it creates resource imbalance . Value of sheep would be very high initially & mid game. Anyone with decent trading skills and reaching the port first should win with red and grey being favorites.
Great video! For 4th position, what about reversing the order of placement? to start with ore (difficult to get) and wood (higher chance of getting brick later).
For 4th position, I picked the 6/9/2 wheat and wood spot and the 8/5/10 wheat and brick spot. My thinking was that I would likely be able to secure both the wheat and wood ports and also play a longest road game. Strong wheat with the wheat port would help make up for the lack of ore. Thoughts? Thank you for posting these videos! edit: typo, changed ore to wood.
Nice video man, why did you not consider the 4,11,5 at any point. Thought it may have been an option for blue on his 2nd placement for one of every resource.
First position I would place 5,6,9 because it is one of the highest points of production and there is lots really good wheat/wood spots on the board Second position I would place wood 11,3,6 because you have good expansion spots towards the low sheep and there are a lot of really good outs Going off what you picked second for the third position I would pick the 3,6,11 with the sheep and the are still some really good outs with this Fourth position i would place at the 3,4,8 on the left for the last available ore and wheat spot and the for the fourth persons second settlement I’m not very sure but I would probably place at the 3,8,10
As player 4, I was looking at the lack of ore, the high wheat production, and close proximity of the 2:1 wheat port to one of the highest wheat spots. Why go with what you did over choosing either the 8/5/10 or 8/10/3 followed by the 6/9/2? That way you lock up the best wheat spots, encouraging others to trade their sheep for your wheat so you can expand the 2:1 port, then get cards of your choice every turn?
Port strategies are inherently inefficient because you have to port your cards at a 2:1 ratio. Every 10 cards you get it’s actually only 5 cards (though it’s your choice). Also, playing a game with only 3 out of the 5 resources is not a good idea.
I'm thinking the 8-5-10 spot, with two brik and one wheat looks pretty good. That would give you an excellent supply of brick, which would be great for trading. Plus its near a 2 for 1 wheat port. I might also have gone with, especially as player 4, the 6-9-2 wheat and two wood spot, and gone for the longest road. Plenty of people will need your wheat and brick, so trading should work out OK.
As 4th I would have gone completely different. The 6/9/2 with the wood and the nearby 10/5/8. This would give me a bunch of road production and easy access to the wheat port which I would have great production on. The wood port would be easy to scoop up as well. I feel like I would be better off trading 2:1 with my great production for ore than to hope to roll that 3 and only make ore on 1 out of every 18 die rolls.
As the fourth player I would have chosen the 5-10-8 first and second, the 9-10-2 pointing towards the left, since you get a free road in the beginning and you can reach the 6 wheat easily. In addition you will get for sure longest road and you can also reach the wheat port in few rounds. You have no ore but at the end, you are settling on the 3 ore which is quite unlikely to roll. I think my choice is stronger, since lacking sheep you won't be able to get largest army and longest road seems fundamental in that scenario. What do you think guys?
As third possition i would rather have placed my seccond house on the 4/11/5. It is only 9 points of production compared to your two top pics, however you then have all the resources an you can expand to the 9/10/11 and get more brick and wood. Than you can use your strong brick port and have a strong wood brick game without lacking ore to upgrade to cities.
Daniel Beadle While I don’t totally agree with the 4/5/11, I think that’s a lot better of a pick compared to the 8/3/4. At the time of making this video, I was very influenced by the people I was talking with. I think I’m a lot better of a player and disagree with some of their points. In this case, placing on the 8/3/4 as 3rd. The 4/5/11 or the 6/9/2 are both much stronger options.
Regarding blue's second village (village numbered 6). I usually would argue having both ore and wheat on the same "synchronized" number is a good thing. You often need ore and wheat together, so getting them at the same time is a benefit. If you manage to city up those two locations, each 6 rolled will give you almost all the resources towards building your third city. Is there no merit to reason like this? (I am quite a novice player).
How would 3rd position get the bricks and wood to build to the ports? They would need 2 of each resource to settle on a port. It looks like a lot of trading to just be able to convert sheep or wheat. I just played a game where I was locked out of wood and was unable to build roads or settlements so I’m just wondering what you would do in a position where you have low wood and/or bricks
For the 4th position, wouldn't 6/2/9 and 10/8/3 be better? It locks everyone out of wheat, have access to the wheat port, and plenty of road building capabilities. Everyone will have to trade you for wheat, or you can use the port!
(Premise: I ABSOLUTELY am not a good player, I'm new to the game and here to learn, so I may be wrong) 6:00 I disagree about blue's 2nd settlment. I would build on the 4-11-5. Less wheat, but all resources, and the possibility to build roads fast and easly in order to take the 4-11 for a lot of sheeps (from the player who takes the 8-4-3), and/or the 10-3-11 (yeah, dubling the 3-wheat and triplicating the 11-wood-wood-sheep... but it's the 3/4 settlment, and in this way I can make the 11-12 usefull with that brick port in the late game!). Last but not the least: you theoretically connect all the settlment in order to compete for long road or at least slow down the player who want it. Beacuse no one can cut off your roads from 12 to 4, the "sheep coast" XD What do you think about it? P. S. I correctly guessed the first settlment for player 1 and 2, I was enthusiastic :D I'm learnign fast and apparently good.
Hey! No need to bash yourself like that; we are all trying to get better including me. I'm glad you disagree. I love discussion. That being said, I really like that spot you suggested 4/5/11(#6). I think it could be viable especially with the brick port but there are 3 things that I would caution. 1) I would be somewhat afraid of getting cut off by the free road if someone placed on that 9/10/11. 2) This gives 1st and 2nd position a lot of expansion space and they are strong in road building. 3) Lastly, if you don't concentrate on a specific goal like road or army, sometimes you lose it entirely. Think of it as opportunity cost. If I concentrate on all Ore/wheat/sheep, I should have a high chance of getting largest army. If I switch some of that production to road building, then I sacrifice some potential of getting largest army for a bit of road building that won't get me longest road. About connecting your roads as blue, Yes! Good idea, but I would be careful only to do that as a surprise move to win the game. If you do it without winning the game, you are most likely going to lose it and waste roads. Edit: I also wanted to add good job on getting the correct 1st and 2nd picks! This channel is all about learning, so I'm glad you are improving. Along with learning, there sometimes isn't always a correct answer so I like when others challenge what I present. It makes both people critically think about why the reason they think that.
@@DyLightedCatan (1) It's a risk, but red and grey need wheat, so they'll go for the 6 and the 8. This means that only the one on the 6-2-9 can actually steal the 9-10-11. Also, as you said, red and grey want to build on the coast for the ports, especially the wood one, maybe they'll no rush for the spot in the middle of the map. (2) Agree (3) Agree...but. Friday I won with 4 settlement, 2 victory point and both road and army XD (Actually a strange board, with a lot of wheat... 12-11-3...and my 5, almost always blocked) I noticed that when I start with no wood/brick/sheep I need to trade too much and the start it's too slow, other players steal the best spot for my settlement. Usually I don't take long road, but at least at the beginning I need some fast roads in order to secure 1 or 2 good spots for settlements. P. S. I was like "Well, it seems I'm a pro already, I guessed 2 on 2" XD
What about 3rd positions 2nd settlement on the 4/5/11 at 6:30?? Also 10 production points he can point his road to the 9/10/11 since 2nd and 1sr position need wheat. I feel like this would give him a strong game no?
2nd position should definitely go right with their first road towards 9 sheep/10 ore. As you said, it likely they won't have a sheep tile in their starting positions. So 9 sheep is much better than that 3:1. 9 sheep/10 ore itself is not good enough for a starting position for anyone (especially since the desert is in the outer ring, so there are many 3 tiles spots). It is unlikely 1st position will compete for it since it is unlikely that 1st position would win that competition. 2nd position has strong wood and brick and can and should take that small risk. Even if that would happen, 2nd posiiton can choose a save expansion route for their 2nd starting town.
I'm a noob, so I definitely took this analysis too far with loads of faulty assumptions. might as well share my reasoning tho, if only so I can reevaluate it in the future. for 1st position, I was thinking they'd actually point down. there's two spots with wood+brick+wheat, so they can win the race to the 9 10 no matter what, and in your analysis second position wasn't racing there anyways as 3rd, for second settlement I'd think of getting on the 5 10 8 to feed my brick port and for 4th position, I was thinking 2910 and the 843 with 2 wheat, both pointing right (maybe change order depending if you prefer starting with a road but waiting for sheep) you'll get the wheat port, and it's unlikely someone takes the 6-9 to your left, as it's a long race and an unlikely second settle. with amazing wheat, sufficient sheep, and superior wood+brick than 2nd player, you're set to at least place 5 settles and get longest road, and possibly get some cities or dev cards. while monopolizing most wheat, which means the other players won't have a clean OWS unless they take the 6-9... ok, the first or second player would likely take the 6-9, leaving you with a tough race for the 6-2, if you lose that your wheat won't be that good. so maybe point left and start with the road to make sure you get there. you risk third player taking the wheat port by pointing left and trading for wood early on, so if the other players see you as a threat you could lose it. but that'd give the third player strong brick which is also bad, so they might not trade their wood with him that indeed leaves both brick+wood+wheat spots for 1st player as a deterrent for 2nd player to have pointed right at the start. between 1st and 2nd, one is likely taking the 6-9 while the other takes the 11-5-4. but with that in mind, if 2nd is willing to weaken themselves, they can still point right at the start, and then take the 4-5-11, meaning 1st is taking the weaker 10-11-3 just to win the race to the 10-9, and 2nd can then expand to the 9-4 or better, the 6-9, as well as the 3-4-8 which is left open in this setup. the downside is you're foregoing the easy starting port, so you'll struggle to make all those settlements to really boom your economy. i suppose 2nd and 3rd could end up trading wood for sheep, which means 3rd _can_ race to the wheat port and screw 4th over... .. hmm, watching further, those choices for 4th make more sense production-wise, but I'd be afraid of 3rd taking the 2-9-10 to cut me off the wheat port, and get that extra brick for their port, and they can also get the 6-2 later for the wheat as well. you're also leavin the 843 with wheat which is a banger spot for 1st and second which otherwise had no wheat, plus the 6-2-9 as you mentioned. as 4th, I'd prefer my placements to force them to either take less wheat in the middle or take the ugly 6-9, and getting the 6-2 spot for third settle makes up for the lack of production in the 2-9-10. I don't think the 3 ore makes up for all that, and replacing the 8 wood 9+2 isn't that bad. again tho there's a huge problem with potentially being raced on two fronts. so I guess another option for 4th is the 6-9-2 and the 5-10-8. you get the 4 best numbers (with a 2 though), and you guarantee the wheat port. but you go without either sheep or ore, and the port can't possibly cover both. but then there's no race to worry about and you're only giving up the 8-4-3 to the 3rd player. if you can manage to trade sheep with other players you might still end up doing great. one problem is when you get your third high-wheat settle you'll only be touching 1 tile which I don't like, specially for something you'll be porting away, even though the total production is way better. you could be bold and instead do the 6-9. if someone is bold they can take the 2-9-10 and take one of your necessary spots. i was thinking pairing it with the 2-5-10 but then your game becomes WAY too slow. if noone took the 2-9-10 that'd be a great choice though, as you can third settle there, get strong roads and wheat, plus the port. but I think it's very likely someone does take it since it gives them the good wheat, 2nd player for example might go for it. so I think the 6-2-9 and 5-10-8 is better.
If you roll two dice, there are 36 possible outcomes. Only one of them is a 2, therefore the 2 has one production point. But there are five ways to roll a 6,so the 6 has five production points. The chance to roll a 6 is 5 times as high as the chance to roll a 2. Some publishers print those points on the number chips and they are also visible in the catan universe app.
Good stuff. People always place those greedy first roads and make that mistake pointing towards the wood/brick spots for the insta-cutoff. Tricky strategy idea here: As blue get to the brick port even though you don't have any brick. You are the player most likely to get dev cards and therefore monopoly, and everyone else is on 5 brick. When everyone cities up it won't be that hard for a 5 or two to roll in one orbit, could be like 12 bricks for the port, game over :)
I like the idea, but getting a monopoly is a 2/25 chance. But as blue you're buying Dev cards, so it's a lot more possible this can happen. Good catch, I never really thought of that.
I think your production is way too low if you choose those placements. I don't think that's a viable option. I don't like taking the coast spots if it's not needed.
why not as the 4th player place on the 5\10\8 and the 6/9/2 and get to the wheat port as fast as possible and take it from there. With 10point of production of wheat and a lot of wood and brick you will have an easy time building longest road as it is also unlikely anyone will come to that part of the board as there are no good spots left + you are blocking 2 players from getting good wheat as you block almost all of the wheat options
You have to purchase the game. I'm assuming that right now you only have the demo version which only allows you to play on a single board with 3 players. The cost of the base game is 5$. You'll have to get 500 gold to purchase the base game.
In my opinion you are doing an excellent job an I really loke forward, when we might play one day together. ;) Anyway, I know this is always kinda subjectiv, but if I was in 3rd (blue) I wouldn't place on the 6 ore spot, because this comes with a very big problem: its the only really good ore i t the game so grey and purple while always block it when they have the chance to so so. So you're not only maxbe losing your ore, you also have the quite impressiv danger to get robbed from ressources you have traded for (brick and wood when you place your settlement on the 3/4/8), which would be REALLY bad. But i really confirm all other decision this time so, goos to see we are not that different types players. ;) And about the future things and buildings you want to do: That's always hard to say, because (for example) as grey or purple: when there is no 3/10 rolled and you haven't the ability to trade for ore, its nearly impossible to build a city. So of course you have to have a plan, how you can reach 10 points, but you have to build what you can afford. So hope to see another video from you :)
About the 6 ore, good point that it will be a big target in the game. However, as I said before that Blue will have to be going heavy development cards and that means they will have a lot of knights to defend themselves with (if they play it correctly). Also about the build paths/priorities, you're right you can't really do much if those numbers simply don't roll. That being said, they are just general guidelines or plans that you can stray from.
@@DyLightedCatan Hmm, maybe you are right about the knights, but I still think there are better options to choose, cause when there is no 6 or its blocked from the start off, buying knights will be pretty hard/impossible and your game is done. Well, I agree on that point, you have to have goals for the game. But good not all of us play the same way and there isn't a right solution for every situation. ;) But nice to discuss about. :)
@@l.a.171 Agreed! We all have different play styles and I think this changes especially in a real life game. There really isn't always a right answer which is why I encourage everyone to challenge these spots! More discussion the better!
The argument of diversifying numbers is flawed. It is better to get ore and weat together than apart since you need them together. Also, to win in catan you have to be the best out of four. That involves some luck. If you diversify your numbers you increas your chanse of finishing 2nd or 3rd, and decreases the chance of the extremes namely 1st and 4th.
Daniel Beadle Yep. That’s exactly the flawed logic I was talking about. I pinned my comment about the coordinated ore/wheat is too strong. It was some bad logic to say “diversify” numbers.
i would say it depends on how strong your opponents are. if they are better than you, might wanna go for the hail mary and stack the numbers. If youre better, might wanna play it safe. just a thought
3rd possitions 2nd settle sucks, with that placement they are the the weakest player togather with purple. If they would have taken the 4/11/5 i would have prefered them i think.
I'm going to make a decision and actually go against the consensus of pick number 6 (2nd settlement for blue at 7:00).
If I could make changes, for blue I would actually place on the 6/9/2 instead of the 8/3/4. The reasoning for this is to get more resource diversity. By placing on the 8/3/4 you heavily rely on the 6 ore to roll, and as the gray and purple player, I will always choose to block that spot. I think this makes for a very difficult game for blue if they place on 8/3/4.
About number diversity, I do think to double up on 6 is bad, but I think it rolls a bit too often for you to get "unlucky" and not have many 6's in a game. On the other hand, coordinating complimenting resources (wood/brick and ore/wheat) in the same roll is quite nice and prevents you from burning cards to the robber since you can use them on your turn. In this case, the ore and wheat are both on the 6's. This is useful for getting cities quickly since ore and wheat come at the same time. In addition, this gives blue a bit more road building potential (9 wood) which is very nice.
I'm a much less experienced casual player so please correct me if my reasoning is flawed, but walking through the exercise (I ended up making every choice the same as in the video with the exception of third position's 2nd settlement, where I chose the 6/9/2 instead of the 8/4/3), my rationale for the 6/9/2 settlement was that, if you take the 8/4/3 then grey takes the 6/9/2 and gets their strong setup with easy access to the wood port to make up for their lack of sheep and has enough wood and brick to be versatile in their game plan, but if you take the 6/9/2 you force them to take the 8/4/3 where they're more likely to be flooded with wheat/sheep they can't utilize as well with their limited ore production, and no relevant 2:1 ports to access to make up for that imbalance in the late game when no one is willing to trade.
You still get a strong start, but one of your opponents' starts is arguably weaker; isn't that a better scenario?
@@ChrisKogawa It is, which is why now I'm advocating for the 6/9/2 placement.
I'm agreeing here too, and while I'm not a pro, I was thinking the 6,9,2 for same reason above of using a critical spot from my opponent (didn't consider flooding my opponent's hand though)
Just started playing, so I apologise for the ignorance. Why not the 9, 10, 2? You would point your road left, get the resources you are lacking, and most likely have the 6 wheat to yourself? Unless someone takes the 6, 9 dessert?
"No ore, you're done for"
"No wheat = defeat"
"Settle on the coast, you're toast"
Anything else?
Hahah I love these rhymes! Unfortunately I think that’s all I have for now.
Amazing! Definitely need more of these rhymes!
The build paths and priorities definitely helped me a lot. I'm getting better at deciding where to place settlements, but it's still so hard for me to picture where I could expand in the future. Thanks for stating everything so clearly, and also for the clear visuals on the board. It makes such a complicated game feel easy to understand!
Thank you! I’m glad you learned something. I’m also a visual learner so I thought it’d be essential to have something go on the board.
loved that video. Its one of the first catan videos I watched and it dealt with exactly the problematic I was looking for. Can't wait to get onto steam and play some catan! Thank you for the content! Keep going! And hopefully our paths never cross ingame!
Love these videos! keep em coming, helping me a lot on my home games. Kudos man!
Thank you! I love that you can apply it to your games! Hurray for making an impact!
Love this format. Very good speaker as I've said before. Keep them coming!
Thank you! Appreciate the kind words!
Love all your videos, this one was especially good. I like the format, hope you do more like this where we think through every players initial setup and priorities
Awesome! Check my World’s 2012 Finals video. I break down everyone’s position. It’s pretty similar. I’m glad you’re liking the content! Thank you!
@@DyLightedCatan That one was great as well! Thanks so much for the tip
Wonderful video, I got almost every settlement position right but I really did not think about build paths and priorities. That was a great section of the video, I learned a lot!
this was a fantastic video that helped me a lot! more please!
i watched this video an hour ago, played my first game online and won. second place had 7 points. brilliant strategies, thanks my man!
You’re the MVP!!! I‘m watching your videos since 3 days now and I won every single game, or got at least 2nd place 😍 You 100% create the Videos I was looking for 🤤
I know I'm late to responding, but thanks! I'm so glad I could help out.
These are very helpful. Thank you!
No problem!
Really insightful
great video to start. ty
Thanks! I hope this helped!
Great videos man. Really have learned a lot from your analysis and insight! I had a thought here as 4th player that I was hoping you could shed some light on. With the other three players really needing wheat desperately, what are your thoughts of P4 going on the 8-5-10 and the 6-9-2? You pretty much lock up the wheat and wood port which you can use for sheep/ore. You should absolutely be competitive for long road with ability to connect too. At the same time, you really hinder other players' strategies. Player 1/2 will be forced to settle for less reliable wheat, which will absolutely help you out. Interested to hear your thoughts!
Thanks dylighted
Great video.
I found myself choosing differently in each scenario for different reasons.
First position 956 might be best, but i think another strong play is to get the 854 and point the road down to get the 8T and locking off the west side of the map to myself, knowing that I should be able to get a 6 with my second settlement. (I weight heavily on number diversification on my decisions if I can help it).
Second position I'd get 695 (these 2 can go in either order). I'd point the road to the left hoping for the 9T
Third I'd get 85T with the road pointing towards the wheat port knowing that I'm guaranteed the 692 as my next settlement getting massive wheat to go with my port and good road production.
Fourth and fifth has to get 843 and 6311 for a nice development card game. Point the roads towards the coast
Sixth I'd get 692 as planned and point the road towards the wood port
7th I'm picking the 9411 denying red the other good position.
8th I think is stuck taking the 6 wood port. But This isn't that bad a scenario because you will have great wood production and good expansion opportunities to get the 8T as planned, then 43 and 83 and play for the longest road.
Love the videos! But do you have any video explaining "production points"?? @dylighted
Hey, great video! Enjoyed the reasoning behind each pick. I wondered if you considered the 6-2-9 for Purple's 2nd placement as they have the same wood advantage as grey and also potential access to the wheat port. Brick should be aplenty on the board to trade for. But also importantly it puts grey in a very difficult position (assuming blue's plan doesn't change) as he needs the wheat so is pretty forced onto the 8-5-10. It's possibly more of a gamble (reducing spread of resource) but does diversify numbers to counter. Maybe I'm just a risk junky!
Only guy I know to tell us it's okay not to like his video if we didn't like it.
defintely learned something. watching your other matches, i was able to guess the majority of these. but they were guesses though. but its like you said, theres no correct place, only most viable.
Well said! I’m glad you’re able to pick something up!
Nice work! It'd be cool for you to play the game out with 3 other players and then show who won and whether their strategy changed throughout the game.
Hahaha! Actually, we ended up playing on this board! Neonate won! As I said, I believe the other 2 players are a lot more skilled and experienced than I am.
i think u need to build the 4th Settlement on the 5/10/8 and then the 5th on the 3/4/8 so you will get ore first because its more importent and rare for you.
Thank you for this; very helpful. Looking at that second blue pick: you are ignoring the 9/10/11 spot completely; I guess the rationale being that wheat production takes priority over having access to road building via wood/brick?
Picking up on other comments, for second blue pick, if you went for the 4/5/11 spot then this neutralises the 5 brick roll of the dice since all 4 players now have this; would that matter?
Taking the best ore along with a twinge of wheat is a lot better than getting wood/brick.
Second question: Yes it would matter because then everyone at the same time would need wood. It makes it hard to trade brick.
The priorities part was interesting, but is it useful? Like if you get a bunch of settlement resources, you're going to do all that work to trade them, probably losing some value & time, to get the city instead? It's good to know which settlement you'd (1) build or (2) upgrade first if you had appropriate resources, but I feel like that's as far as it goes.
How do you calculate production points
Great video once again. Agreed with all placement although it creates resource imbalance . Value of sheep would be very high initially & mid game. Anyone with decent trading skills and reaching the port first should win with red and grey being favorites.
Yes! Agreed that red and gray are the favorites. They also have the most options too.
Great video! For 4th position, what about reversing the order of placement? to start with ore (difficult to get) and wood (higher chance of getting brick later).
Duh! I don't know I didn't do that in the video. Good catch!
@@DyLightedCatan thanks! looking forward for the second part of your first tournament. Seriously! :)
For 4th position, I picked the 6/9/2 wheat and wood spot and the 8/5/10 wheat and brick spot. My thinking was that I would likely be able to secure both the wheat and wood ports and also play a longest road game. Strong wheat with the wheat port would help make up for the lack of ore. Thoughts? Thank you for posting these videos!
edit: typo, changed ore to wood.
Nice video man, why did you not consider the 4,11,5 at any point. Thought it may have been an option for blue on his 2nd placement for one of every resource.
dream 247 Good thought! I think this may have been a strong alternative, but we didn’t like the spots it gave to the 3rd and 4th player.
what do you mean production points, im not sure what youre adding up to get 13 at the start
How do you count production points? I can’t figure it out..
First position I would place 5,6,9 because it is one of the highest points of production and there is lots really good wheat/wood spots on the board
Second position I would place wood 11,3,6 because you have good expansion spots towards the low sheep and there are a lot of really good outs
Going off what you picked second for the third position I would pick the 3,6,11 with the sheep and the are still some really good outs with this
Fourth position i would place at the 3,4,8 on the left for the last available ore and wheat spot and the for the fourth persons second settlement I’m not very sure but I would probably place at the 3,8,10
As player 4, I was looking at the lack of ore, the high wheat production, and close proximity of the 2:1 wheat port to one of the highest wheat spots. Why go with what you did over choosing either the 8/5/10 or 8/10/3 followed by the 6/9/2? That way you lock up the best wheat spots, encouraging others to trade their sheep for your wheat so you can expand the 2:1 port, then get cards of your choice every turn?
Port strategies are inherently inefficient because you have to port your cards at a 2:1 ratio. Every 10 cards you get it’s actually only 5 cards (though it’s your choice). Also, playing a game with only 3 out of the 5 resources is not a good idea.
Why not do the 4th posititon on 629, this way you block the wheats a bit and you will get more production
As second I would go on 4/5/8 because it locks 3 very good spots forcing people to place on coast
As a gamble, what if you place on 6/2/9 as 4 pos instead of 3/4/8?
I'm thinking the 8-5-10 spot, with two brik and one wheat looks pretty good. That would give you an excellent supply of brick, which would be great for trading. Plus its near a 2 for 1 wheat port. I might also have gone with, especially as player 4, the 6-9-2 wheat and two wood spot, and gone for the longest road. Plenty of people will need your wheat and brick, so trading should work out OK.
hi, why would I not take the 4/5/11 as 3rd position when placing 2nd settlement? ^^
Sorry, how do you calculate the production values? any link?
Post more man
As 4th I would have gone completely different. The 6/9/2 with the wood and the nearby 10/5/8. This would give me a bunch of road production and easy access to the wheat port which I would have great production on. The wood port would be easy to scoop up as well. I feel like I would be better off trading 2:1 with my great production for ore than to hope to roll that 3 and only make ore on 1 out of every 18 die rolls.
As the fourth player I would have chosen the 5-10-8 first and second, the 9-10-2 pointing towards the left, since you get a free road in the beginning and you can reach the 6 wheat easily. In addition you will get for sure longest road and you can also reach the wheat port in few rounds. You have no ore but at the end, you are settling on the 3 ore which is quite unlikely to roll. I think my choice is stronger, since lacking sheep you won't be able to get largest army and longest road seems fundamental in that scenario. What do you think guys?
As third possition i would rather have placed my seccond house on the 4/11/5. It is only 9 points of production compared to your two top pics, however you then have all the resources an you can expand to the 9/10/11 and get more brick and wood. Than you can use your strong brick port and have a strong wood brick game without lacking ore to upgrade to cities.
Daniel Beadle While I don’t totally agree with the 4/5/11, I think that’s a lot better of a pick compared to the 8/3/4. At the time of making this video, I was very influenced by the people I was talking with. I think I’m a lot better of a player and disagree with some of their points. In this case, placing on the 8/3/4 as 3rd. The 4/5/11 or the 6/9/2 are both much stronger options.
I also think this is the best pick.
why wouldn't thurd position go for the 9-10-11 for their second placement and get all the resources?
Regarding blue's second village (village numbered 6). I usually would argue having both ore and wheat on the same "synchronized" number is a good thing. You often need ore and wheat together, so getting them at the same time is a benefit. If you manage to city up those two locations, each 6 rolled will give you almost all the resources towards building your third city. Is there no merit to reason like this? (I am quite a novice player).
No that is a very valid reason! That's partially why I would change some things for this video. The "coordinated 6's" are amazing. Good point!
How would 3rd position get the bricks and wood to build to the ports? They would need 2 of each resource to settle on a port. It looks like a lot of trading to just be able to convert sheep or wheat. I just played a game where I was locked out of wood and was unable to build roads or settlements so I’m just wondering what you would do in a position where you have low wood and/or bricks
You’d probably have to trade, but I don’t think I did the placements correct in this video. This was one of my first videos I’ve made.
For the 4th position, wouldn't 6/2/9 and 10/8/3 be better? It locks everyone out of wheat, have access to the wheat port, and plenty of road building capabilities. Everyone will have to trade you for wheat, or you can use the port!
(Premise: I ABSOLUTELY am not a good player, I'm new to the game and here to learn, so I may be wrong)
6:00
I disagree about blue's 2nd settlment.
I would build on the 4-11-5. Less wheat, but all resources, and the possibility to build roads fast and easly in order to take the 4-11 for a lot of sheeps (from the player who takes the 8-4-3), and/or the 10-3-11 (yeah, dubling the 3-wheat and triplicating the 11-wood-wood-sheep... but it's the 3/4 settlment, and in this way I can make the 11-12 usefull with that brick port in the late game!).
Last but not the least: you theoretically connect all the settlment in order to compete for long road or at least slow down the player who want it. Beacuse no one can cut off your roads from 12 to 4, the "sheep coast" XD
What do you think about it?
P. S. I correctly guessed the first settlment for player 1 and 2, I was enthusiastic :D I'm learnign fast and apparently good.
Hey! No need to bash yourself like that; we are all trying to get better including me. I'm glad you disagree. I love discussion. That being said, I really like that spot you suggested 4/5/11(#6). I think it could be viable especially with the brick port but there are 3 things that I would caution.
1) I would be somewhat afraid of getting cut off by the free road if someone placed on that 9/10/11.
2) This gives 1st and 2nd position a lot of expansion space and they are strong in road building.
3) Lastly, if you don't concentrate on a specific goal like road or army, sometimes you lose it entirely. Think of it as opportunity cost. If I concentrate on all Ore/wheat/sheep, I should have a high chance of getting largest army. If I switch some of that production to road building, then I sacrifice some potential of getting largest army for a bit of road building that won't get me longest road.
About connecting your roads as blue, Yes! Good idea, but I would be careful only to do that as a surprise move to win the game. If you do it without winning the game, you are most likely going to lose it and waste roads.
Edit: I also wanted to add good job on getting the correct 1st and 2nd picks! This channel is all about learning, so I'm glad you are improving. Along with learning, there sometimes isn't always a correct answer so I like when others challenge what I present. It makes both people critically think about why the reason they think that.
@@DyLightedCatan (1) It's a risk, but red and grey need wheat, so they'll go for the 6 and the 8. This means that only the one on the 6-2-9 can actually steal the 9-10-11.
Also, as you said, red and grey want to build on the coast for the ports, especially the wood one, maybe they'll no rush for the spot in the middle of the map.
(2) Agree
(3) Agree...but. Friday I won with 4 settlement, 2 victory point and both road and army XD (Actually a strange board, with a lot of wheat... 12-11-3...and my 5, almost always blocked)
I noticed that when I start with no wood/brick/sheep I need to trade too much and the start it's too slow, other players steal the best spot for my settlement.
Usually I don't take long road, but at least at the beginning I need some fast roads in order to secure 1 or 2 good spots for settlements.
P. S. I was like "Well, it seems I'm a pro already, I guessed 2 on 2" XD
What about 3rd positions 2nd settlement on the 4/5/11 at 6:30?? Also 10 production points he can point his road to the 9/10/11 since 2nd and 1sr position need wheat. I feel like this would give him a strong game no?
I guess that you would give red too strong of a wheat spot but still worth considering
2nd position should definitely go right with their first road towards 9 sheep/10 ore. As you said, it likely they won't have a sheep tile in their starting positions. So 9 sheep is much better than that 3:1. 9 sheep/10 ore itself is not good enough for a starting position for anyone (especially since the desert is in the outer ring, so there are many 3 tiles spots). It is unlikely 1st position will compete for it since it is unlikely that 1st position would win that competition. 2nd position has strong wood and brick and can and should take that small risk. Even if that would happen, 2nd posiiton can choose a save expansion route for their 2nd starting town.
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I'm a noob, so I definitely took this analysis too far with loads of faulty assumptions. might as well share my reasoning tho, if only so I can reevaluate it in the future.
for 1st position, I was thinking they'd actually point down. there's two spots with wood+brick+wheat, so they can win the race to the 9 10 no matter what, and in your analysis second position wasn't racing there anyways
as 3rd, for second settlement I'd think of getting on the 5 10 8 to feed my brick port
and for 4th position, I was thinking 2910 and the 843 with 2 wheat, both pointing right (maybe change order depending if you prefer starting with a road but waiting for sheep)
you'll get the wheat port, and it's unlikely someone takes the 6-9 to your left, as it's a long race and an unlikely second settle. with amazing wheat, sufficient sheep, and superior wood+brick than 2nd player, you're set to at least place 5 settles and get longest road, and possibly get some cities or dev cards. while monopolizing most wheat, which means the other players won't have a clean OWS unless they take the 6-9... ok, the first or second player would likely take the 6-9, leaving you with a tough race for the 6-2, if you lose that your wheat won't be that good. so maybe point left and start with the road to make sure you get there. you risk third player taking the wheat port by pointing left and trading for wood early on, so if the other players see you as a threat you could lose it. but that'd give the third player strong brick which is also bad, so they might not trade their wood with him
that indeed leaves both brick+wood+wheat spots for 1st player as a deterrent for 2nd player to have pointed right at the start. between 1st and 2nd, one is likely taking the 6-9 while the other takes the 11-5-4. but with that in mind, if 2nd is willing to weaken themselves, they can still point right at the start, and then take the 4-5-11, meaning 1st is taking the weaker 10-11-3 just to win the race to the 10-9, and 2nd can then expand to the 9-4 or better, the 6-9, as well as the 3-4-8 which is left open in this setup. the downside is you're foregoing the easy starting port, so you'll struggle to make all those settlements to really boom your economy. i suppose 2nd and 3rd could end up trading wood for sheep, which means 3rd _can_ race to the wheat port and screw 4th over...
.. hmm, watching further, those choices for 4th make more sense production-wise, but I'd be afraid of 3rd taking the 2-9-10 to cut me off the wheat port, and get that extra brick for their port, and they can also get the 6-2 later for the wheat as well. you're also leavin the 843 with wheat which is a banger spot for 1st and second which otherwise had no wheat, plus the 6-2-9 as you mentioned. as 4th, I'd prefer my placements to force them to either take less wheat in the middle or take the ugly 6-9, and getting the 6-2 spot for third settle makes up for the lack of production in the 2-9-10. I don't think the 3 ore makes up for all that, and replacing the 8 wood 9+2 isn't that bad. again tho there's a huge problem with potentially being raced on two fronts.
so I guess another option for 4th is the 6-9-2 and the 5-10-8. you get the 4 best numbers (with a 2 though), and you guarantee the wheat port. but you go without either sheep or ore, and the port can't possibly cover both. but then there's no race to worry about and you're only giving up the 8-4-3 to the 3rd player. if you can manage to trade sheep with other players you might still end up doing great. one problem is when you get your third high-wheat settle you'll only be touching 1 tile which I don't like, specially for something you'll be porting away, even though the total production is way better. you could be bold and instead do the 6-9. if someone is bold they can take the 2-9-10 and take one of your necessary spots. i was thinking pairing it with the 2-5-10 but then your game becomes WAY too slow. if noone took the 2-9-10 that'd be a great choice though, as you can third settle there, get strong roads and wheat, plus the port. but I think it's very likely someone does take it since it gives them the good wheat, 2nd player for example might go for it. so I think the 6-2-9 and 5-10-8 is better.
Hello. What are production points?
André Pinheiro Production points are just the little dots under the number, the more production points, the more likely it is to roll.
What are productionpoints? I ask silly questions!😋 but i really don't know yet!
If you roll two dice, there are 36 possible outcomes. Only one of them is a 2, therefore the 2 has one production point. But there are five ways to roll a 6,so the 6 has five production points. The chance to roll a 6 is 5 times as high as the chance to roll a 2. Some publishers print those points on the number chips and they are also visible in the catan universe app.
@@Silverback947 ofcourse! 😋
Thank you for your answer!
🤗
Good stuff. People always place those greedy first roads and make that mistake pointing towards the wood/brick spots for the insta-cutoff. Tricky strategy idea here: As blue get to the brick port even though you don't have any brick. You are the player most likely to get dev cards and therefore monopoly, and everyone else is on 5 brick. When everyone cities up it won't be that hard for a 5 or two to roll in one orbit, could be like 12 bricks for the port, game over :)
I like the idea, but getting a monopoly is a 2/25 chance. But as blue you're buying Dev cards, so it's a lot more possible this can happen. Good catch, I never really thought of that.
Why not place 8 on 4/5/11 just down one spot. Extra brick
As 4th, placing on 9/10ore, then 4/5/11wood seems viable to me too
I think your production is way too low if you choose those placements. I don't think that's a viable option. I don't like taking the coast spots if it's not needed.
what are production points
They are the amount of little dots on every number! The more the better.
ok thanks
why not as the 4th player place on the 5\10\8 and the 6/9/2 and get to the wheat port as fast as possible and take it from there. With 10point of production of wheat and a lot of wood and brick you will have an easy time building longest road as it is also unlikely anyone will come to that part of the board as there are no good spots left + you are blocking 2 players from getting good wheat as you block almost all of the wheat options
I would have played the first settlement on the bottom 8-5-10
how do u have a random board , i always get the same freaking board
You have to purchase the game. I'm assuming that right now you only have the demo version which only allows you to play on a single board with 3 players. The cost of the base game is 5$. You'll have to get 500 gold to purchase the base game.
@@DyLightedCatan ah ok thanks
In my opinion you are doing an excellent job an I really loke forward, when we might play one day together. ;)
Anyway, I know this is always kinda subjectiv, but if I was in 3rd (blue) I wouldn't place on the 6 ore spot, because this comes with a very big problem: its the only really good ore i t the game so grey and purple while always block it when they have the chance to so so. So you're not only maxbe losing your ore, you also have the quite impressiv danger to get robbed from ressources you have traded for (brick and wood when you place your settlement on the 3/4/8), which would be REALLY bad.
But i really confirm all other decision this time so, goos to see we are not that different types players. ;)
And about the future things and buildings you want to do:
That's always hard to say, because (for example) as grey or purple: when there is no 3/10 rolled and you haven't the ability to trade for ore, its nearly impossible to build a city. So of course you have to have a plan, how you can reach 10 points, but you have to build what you can afford.
So hope to see another video from you :)
About the 6 ore, good point that it will be a big target in the game. However, as I said before that Blue will have to be going heavy development cards and that means they will have a lot of knights to defend themselves with (if they play it correctly).
Also about the build paths/priorities, you're right you can't really do much if those numbers simply don't roll. That being said, they are just general guidelines or plans that you can stray from.
@@DyLightedCatan Hmm, maybe you are right about the knights, but I still think there are better options to choose, cause when there is no 6 or its blocked from the start off, buying knights will be pretty hard/impossible and your game is done.
Well, I agree on that point, you have to have goals for the game. But good not all of us play the same way and there isn't a right solution for every situation. ;)
But nice to discuss about. :)
@@l.a.171 Agreed! We all have different play styles and I think this changes especially in a real life game. There really isn't always a right answer which is why I encourage everyone to challenge these spots! More discussion the better!
The argument of diversifying numbers is flawed. It is better to get ore and weat together than apart since you need them together. Also, to win in catan you have to be the best out of four. That involves some luck. If you diversify your numbers you increas your chanse of finishing 2nd or 3rd, and decreases the chance of the extremes namely 1st and 4th.
Daniel Beadle Yep. That’s exactly the flawed logic I was talking about. I pinned my comment about the coordinated ore/wheat is too strong. It was some bad logic to say “diversify” numbers.
@@DyLightedCatan Didn't see it
I play a lot of 3 player games; diversify the numbers works more often than not for me.
i would say it depends on how strong your opponents are. if they are better than you, might wanna go for the hail mary and stack the numbers. If youre better, might wanna play it safe. just a thought
It's a really good video (sorry 3 y old)
3rd possitions 2nd settle sucks, with that placement they are the the weakest player togather with purple. If they would have taken the 4/11/5 i would have prefered them i think.
I think 4/5/11 or 6/9/2 are both very strong. For sure the 8/4/3 isn’t the right call though.