Playing a game with 2 copies of the same expansion

[carca82]

Now that we own "Inns and Cathedrals" and "Traders and Builders" twice (as part of Big Box 6 and as standalone expansions) we were thinking about playing a game comprising of:

• Base game (+farmers +abbott)
• Inns and Cathedrals twice
• Traders and Builders twice

Do you ever do this or anything similar to this? We were considering in particular whether some home rules were required. For example:

• 10 points for collecting the most of a type of goods may be not enough anymore (number of goods is 2x the usual), and we are thinking about making them 20 or 15.
• Should we be allowed to use two builder meeples?
• What about two pigs? Does this make any sense anyway?

but most importantly:

• Can FOUR chatedrals in the same game be considered a crime of war and be investigated by the UN?

Linkback: https://www.carcassonnecentral.com/community/index.php?topic=6054.0

[DIN0]

Well, the beauty of board games is that you can make whatever house rule you want, so you can try it out 

There is also this house rule which was made up as a way to balance the trade tokens with larger games/other expansions. It makes the point gain scale up with the relative point gain:

"To bring the trade goods in line with the relative scoring of the King and Robber Baron (Count, King and Robber), a player with a majority no longer scores 10 points. Instead, they receive a 10% bonus (or 10 points, whichever is higher) to their total score at the end of the game, after calculating farms and incomplete features, but before calculating any other scores such as those from the King and Robber Baron. Additionally, any player who does not win the majority may be awarded 2 points for every token they own. (Thanks to kissybooboo)"

[Halfling]

When we have played with a double set of a single expansion, we used the extra tiles (and tokens) but not the extra meeples/builders/pigs.

We gave the 10 points for the majority of tokens, we didn't double up.

[carca82]

We decided for these house rules:

• Two big meeples for each player instead of one
• Every inn/cathedral on a completed road/city gives points to its owner (but if they remain open at the end of the game, the owner loses points!)
• Who gets the most of a type of goods gets 10 points + as many points as the number of tokens for that type they got

Wish us good luck! 

[ny1050220]

 

We decided for these house rules:

• Two big meeples for each player instead of one
• Every inn/cathedral on a completed road/city gives points to its owner (but if they remain open at the end of the game, the owner loses points!)
• Who gets the most of a type of goods gets 10 points + as many points as the number of tokens for that type they got

Wish us good luck! 

[kothmann]

Wish us good luck! 

Good luck!

Also, please take photos and note the final Trade Good counts and other important data and then post again to share the results!

Trade good rule sounds good to me.  Cathedrals and Inns seem likely to become mostly weapons of destruction? 

Eager to hear actual results…

[carca82]

Cathedrals and Inns seem likely to become mostly weapons of destruction? 

We expect chaos  Game starts in 2 hours!

[Meepledrone]

Regarding builders, younhave to decide if they stack or not... that is if you cannget a triple turn if your two.builders are in rhe same city. I would say no, the same as the pig. Sonan opponent can counterattack by joining the features with your builders... or you could rectrict your builders to different types of features: only one can be in a city or on a road. Never allow your builders to be both in two cities or two roads.

[carca82]

Done! It was not the chaotic game we feared it would be but it was awesome anyway. Here's just a few info about the game as requested.

The setup for each player was as the following:

• 8 meeples
• 2 big meeples
• 1 pig, 1 abbott, 1 builder

Only once in the game it happened that a player closed a road containing more than one inn. Green got 9 points for the highlighted road shown below, instead of the standard 6:


It never happened that a player closed a city with more than one cathedral, but the game ended with two unfinished cities containing one. In the examples shown below, 8 and 5 points were deducted at the end of the game from Pink and Green , respectively:

This led to a small update of the house rules: next time a cathedral-including uncompleted city will deduct 1 point for every tile AND for every shield. This time the shields were not counted.

Here's the final goods count for Pink and Green , respectively. Pink won Wheat and got 16 points for it, Green won Wine (18 points) and Cloth (16 points):


Here's the final map of the game and the final scoring:

[Drodo]

Using double sets only makes the game lengthier, not more fun just longer. We'd rather pick up more expansions.

[carca82]

Using double sets only makes the game lengthier, not more fun

Well, I can say that's empirically false. We played only one game like that and we had at least as much fun as always.

[Drodo]

It's no different from playing 2 different games in a row. I guess it depends on the group, my friends always want the game to be over whenever it lasts more than 1 and half hours.

[carca82]

It's no different from playing 2 different games in a row. I guess it depends on the group, my friends always want the game to be over whenever it lasts more than 1 and half hours.

Disagree. Tile-counting is heavely hindered with repeated tiles, and that makes strategy a lot more intriguing, and adding house rules made the fight for goods and big cities more tight. But I do guess depends on the group, we never found ourselves wishing the game was over (in Monopoly, yes, but in Carcassone? Never!)

[kothmann]

Done! It was not the chaotic game we feared it would be but it was awesome anyway. Here's just a few info about the game as requested.

Great photos and explanation!  Thanks so much for taking the time to share all of this.  +1 merit from me.

Tile-counting is heavely hindered with repeated tiles, and that makes strategy a lot more intriguing, and adding house rules made the fight for goods and big cities more tight.

The final landscape and scoring looks very well balanced: about 24 completed cities of a variety of sizes, all (?!) of the roads with Inns completed, a nice mixture of small and large farms, with the Green pig well placed, and great house rules for double Trade Goods.  I’m jealous.  :-)

… we never found ourselves wishing the game was over (in Monopoly, yes, but in Carcassone? Never!)

Indeed.  Thanks again.

[Meepledrone]

Awesome game! Thansk for sharing it!!!