Author Topic: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?  (Read 9536 times)

Offline JGreystone

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Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« on: May 20, 2015, 07:20:34 PM »
I apologize if this question has been asked before, and it's an odd one, but here goes:
We really enjoy playing with many expansions -- Inns, Traders, Princess, Mayor, Castles, Bazaars, Hills and Sheep etc. and some of the mini expansions. We like the idea that different tiles offer different activities in the game. Makes it more interesting.

The problem is, of course, that when all these expansions are included, along with the basic game, there are simply too many tiles to be able to finish a game within a reasonable time frame. So, I'm sure that the tiles included with the basic game are engineered to make a "complete game," but, I'm wondering if anyone has figured out if leaving out the original 72 tiles and just playing all the expansion tiles is still a balanced, well-engineered game...if it's still the "same Carcassonne?"  :-\

Any thoughts on this are appreciated.  Thanks

Linkback: https://www.carcassonnecentral.com/community/index.php?topic=1772.0

Offline Whaleyland

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #1 on: May 20, 2015, 07:28:14 PM »
I've done it once. I don't remember which expansions I used but it was a bunch of them. At least I&C, T&B, A&M, and one other large one.

Honestly, I didn't like it. There weren't enough vanilla tiles so virtually everything coming out had a special feature on it. It got pretty messy at times and there were moments when I definitely wished for some of those annoying RRFF tiles or even just a RFRF tile. The expansions often focus on specific feature arrangements not found in the base game, but if you take out the base game, all you have left are strange tile arrangements. I'd certainly not stop you from trying it (like I can anyway!) but I doubt it will prove a satisfactory experience.

Offline Paul

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #2 on: May 21, 2015, 12:22:49 AM »
Imagine playing using only the Tower tiles. That could be an interesting game.  :@
World record holder for a single game of Carcassonne using 10 007 tiles!

Offline danisthirty

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #3 on: May 21, 2015, 12:24:38 AM »
Imagine playing using only the Tower tiles. That could be an interesting game.  :@

Certainly interesting. But thankfully quite short too!  :)

Offline Hounk

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #4 on: May 21, 2015, 12:28:06 AM »
You mean playing only the Tower tiles, or also playing them with the Tower rules?

Offline SRBO

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #5 on: May 21, 2015, 12:38:58 AM »
Look at reviews and sessions, ive put a review on such a game there

LINK
« Last Edit: May 21, 2015, 12:45:47 AM by MrNumbers, Reason: Link added »

Offline danisthirty

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #6 on: May 21, 2015, 12:42:24 AM »
You mean playing only the Tower tiles, or also playing them with the Tower rules?

Well perhaps with the starting tile from the basic game and then all 18 Tower tiles played using the standard Tower rules is how I imagined it. It would be a fairly low scoring game as nowhere would be safe!

Look at reviews and sessions, ive put a review on such a game there

I thought I remembered reading about somebody doing this. Nice one!  :(y)

Offline Paul

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #7 on: May 21, 2015, 02:50:18 AM »
You mean playing only the Tower tiles, or also playing them with the Tower rules?

Yes, Tower tiles, the wooden pieces etc.

One option is to play the Tower expansion fully but without the other tiles (i.e. the base game etc but of couse use the meeples).

Another option is to rewrite the concept. Each game you are supposed to catch as many opponents followers and trade etc. When no more tiles to draw you reset the game and put those captured aside.
  Repeat until only one player left that has any meeples in stock that they can play.
« Last Edit: May 21, 2015, 02:52:20 AM by Paul »

Offline danisthirty

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #8 on: May 21, 2015, 05:05:42 AM »
You mean playing only the Tower tiles, or also playing them with the Tower rules?
Another option is to rewrite the concept. Each game you are supposed to catch as many opponents followers and trade etc. When no more tiles to draw you reset the game and put those captured aside.
  Repeat until only one player left that has any meeples in stock that they can play.

I like the sound of this, but if it was literally all about being the last person with any meeples, it would be too easy to just never deploy anything and the game would always end in a draw (with 7 meeples left each)...

Offline What If?

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #9 on: July 29, 2017, 02:42:07 AM »
I've done it once. I don't remember which expansions I used but it was a bunch of them. At least I&C, T&B, A&M, and one other large one.

Honestly, I didn't like it. There weren't enough vanilla tiles so virtually everything coming out had a special feature on it. It got pretty messy at times and there were moments when I definitely wished for some of those annoying RRFF tiles or even just a RFRF tile. The expansions often focus on specific feature arrangements not found in the base game, but if you take out the base game, all you have left are strange tile arrangements. I'd certainly not stop you from trying it (like I can anyway!) but I doubt it will prove a satisfactory experience.

I agree with you on everything. Especially the road tiles are missing. Since many of us have, I guess, at least one extra base game, I have sorted out 24 road tiles from the base game to use for exactly these sort of games, or 12 if smaller game. many expansions are city-heavy and these road tiles make the difference.
Maybe I shouldn´t buy kathars, what would I do next?

Offline ARabidMeerkat

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #10 on: July 30, 2017, 09:12:04 AM »
We tried a Mega-Carc game with every expansion (we mean every expansion!) and no base game. It was very messy and we scored very little for anything other than cities, due to the lack of monasteries and roads
If only I had another Halfling.....

Offline Just a Bill

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #11 on: August 06, 2017, 11:27:48 AM »
All the comments about roads being under-represented in mega-carc and in expansion sets in general inspired me to design a little 12-tile expansion called Signposts and the Château. Please check it out and tell me what you think (at least hit a few checkboxes on the Poll, if you don't mind). I greatly appreciate your feedback!
My stuff: The Caverns of Carcassonne | Wheel of Fortune versions | True North (wind roses) | Icon facelifts | Converting CII to CI | Signposts & the Château | The Vault | Riverboats & the Whirlpool | trade list

Offline wolnic

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #12 on: August 06, 2017, 02:37:16 PM »
All the comments about roads being under-represented in mega-carc and in expansion sets in general ...

If you want more roads (on official tiles), the Wheel of Fortune scoring tiles are mostly roads ... as Quevy suggested in another thread, take the value on the WoF tiles as bonus points for that road if you don't want to play with the original rules and wheel. Also, the fan-created Wells expansions are all road-based.
AutumnForest (C2), Catch Of The Day (C1/2/WD), Cliffs&W'falls (C1/2), Coast (C1/2), FishHuts (C2), Fluvium (C2), NewForest (C2), Harvest (C1/2), Stone Circles (C1/2), Wells (C2), Jordan River 2 (AotC), River I/II (GR)
Devt: Sakura (C2), WinterEdge (C1), WinterCoast (WD/WE) and others

Offline Just a Bill

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #13 on: August 06, 2017, 03:02:21 PM »
If you want more roads (on official tiles), the Wheel of Fortune scoring tiles are mostly roads ... as Quevy suggested in another thread, take the value on the WoF tiles as bonus points for that road if you don't want to play with the original rules and wheel. Also, the fan-created Wells expansions are all road-based.

So ... you're saying I shouldn't have bothered?

Offline wolnic

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Re: Carcassonne without the Basic Game?
« Reply #14 on: August 06, 2017, 03:30:22 PM »
No, not at all - the more roads the merrier! Some folks don't want to, or don't feel they have the tools/skills to make their own tiles, and would prefer only to use official tiles. I think the original post was about using just the official expansions not the base game an not having enough roads. Although it depends if you want to treat the special WoF tiles as an "expansion" ...


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