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The
Settlers of Catan® (“Settlers” to
its friends) is one of the most popular international
games of the past decade, with the game and its
expansions selling over eleven million copies
worldwide. Players are recent immigrants to the
newly populated island of Catan. Expand Catan
through the building of settlements, roads, and
villages by harvesting commodities from the land
around you. Trade goods with other players, or
at local seaports to get the resources you need.
The first player to achieve 10 points from a combination
of roads, settlements, and special cards wins.
The
game is enjoyed as a fun pastime, but for children
(and adults willing to learn), the game offers
the opportunity to learn and practice many valuable
skills. Here are seven skills that The Settlers
of Catan® emphasizes, both for younger and
older children.
For
younger children (ages 10-14), here are four skills
that the game helps develop:
Probability:
There are games that require you to roll two dice,
but Settlers teaches why there is a difference
between a 2 and an 8 when you roll those dice.
At the beginning of the game, players must choose
among a variety of starting locations, all displaying
values that must be rolled on two dice to be productive.
The number chips actually show the distribution
of dice rolls as dots for each number, so younger
children can simply add up the dots to find the
most attractive locations. As the game progresses,
players must decide where they want to expand
to on the board, and determining which locations
have a higher probability of producing is very
important.
And, of course, there is the concurrent lesson
that just because a number is SUPPOSED to occur
more often than another, doesn’t mean that
it will. It’s a lesson that may not seem
relevant to them now, but, with luck, they will
remember their most frustrating games of Settlers
decades later as their plane lands in Las Vegas
for the first time.
Negotiation:
Anyone who has spent time in a school cafeteria
knows that children understand the basics of trading.
Settlers features both a wide variety of possible
trades and the opportunity to barter from different
positions of power. All of the resources start
as equal in value, making the decision of what
to trade a balance of what resources will benefit
you versus how much your opponent will gain from
the trade. There will also be moments when the
scarcity of a resource will put a player with
said resource in a position of power. A particularly
effective trade can make a huge difference in
a player’s position in the game.
The Settlers of Catan®, like many games, is
a social activity. But, the necessity of negotiation
to success during the game means that a player
must be involved with others. The game necessitates
socialization during every turn throughout the
game, either by creating the absence of a resource
that another player has, or obtaining a surplus
that others are eager to tap into.
Planning:
On the surface, everyone has the same way to win
a game of Settlers—obtain ten victory points.
However, there are multiple ways to reach ten
points. Do you start upgrading settlements, or
extend your roads for new settlements? Do you
take a chance and buy a development card, not
knowing if you’ll get another ore resource
soon? Players must assess their current position
throughout the game in order to decide how best
to collect that next victory point.
Decision Making: There are few “this
or that” decisions to be made during a game
of Settlers. Players have a steady stream of decisions
to make, changing turn-by-turn based on the resources
they gain, the trades that they make, and the
situations created by the other players. The decisions
are complex, but not life-or-death; poor decisions
or bad gambles can be overcome with future play.
The number and variety of decisions strengthen
the techniques players use to sort through their
options to find the best solution.
Younger players will enjoy the game, and the skills
above will serve them well in the process. Furthermore,
these skills connect to many US state educational
standards (scarcity, natural resources, data analysis
and probability, and more).
For
older children (ages 14-18), there are three more
complex skills that the game encourages, to provide
a greater challenge to themselves and their fellow
players.
Competitive
Problem-Solving: It’s one thing to decide
the best path to earning 10 victory points, and
quite another when your fellow players are either
passively trying to do better than you or actively
trying to prevent your success. The longest road
and largest army bonuses are examples of a game
advantage that others are often trying to take
from the player who currently has it. Players
must make decisions planning on players trying
to stop them. Keeping track of their clever play
may both improve their position and downgrade
another’s.
One subplot to the competition in the game, however,
is that the island and its resources are shared
by all players. Using the robber to stop a resource’s
production may hurt one player in the short-term,
but could hurt all players if the resource is
necessary for everyone’s development plans.
Because other players are a source of necessary
goods, players must make decisions based on both
their short-term and long-term effects on the
game.
Value
Assessment: Resource cards, the basic unit
of currency in the game, are equal in value when
they are produced. Once in play, however, each
player values a resource differently based on
their goals and other players’ needs. Over
time, successful Settlers players develop an understanding
of what a resource is worth, based on their current
goals and the demand at the table. Settlers’
active trading gives players frequent opportunities
to test their understanding of the current value
of resources.
Risk Assessment: While younger Settlers
players have many decisions to make, and although
they quickly learn the difference between a good
and a bad trade, their play is often regulated
by their short-term goals. For older players,
their decision-making must be tempered by a variety
of random events. Will the necessary resources
be produced by the dice roll, or should they work
towards obtaining a port (allowing them to convert
one resource to another)? If another player is
perceived as being close to victory, should they
try and prevent their victory (possibly abandoning
their own path to victory), or do they try and
race to add victory points of your own? The Settlers
of Catan® provides a mix of hidden and open
information, and fixed and random events. Successful
players are willing to take a chance when necessary
to improve their chances at victory.
The Settlers of Catan® can be used to demonstrate
and strengthen a variety of skills necessary for
success both in and out of the classroom. Best
of all, it teaches those skills in a highly interactive
and structured social setting that can be enjoyed
by people of all ages!
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