Catan vs Terraforming Mars

This is a game that promotes casual conversation during gameplay. You can haggle for resources with other players. You can create drama by intervening in your opponents plans, for example, by breaking their chain of roads, or building a town in their way to the port. You can also make alliances with other players and then betray them when a better offer comes along.

This game teaches how to bargain, the meaning of scarcity, and how free markets work by forcing players to experience these firsthand. You can play without bargaining, but it is more fun to embrace the economy aspect of this game as it's a great learning tool.

This game allows you to try different, rewarding strategies. For example, you can create a monopoly over one resource, use the ports to trade with the bank for cheaper or try to buy the majority of victory points using the special abilities cards. There are a lot of options, and you can adapt and switch things up as the game goes on.

You also have to think ahead and pay attention to what your opponents are up to. For example, if you've decided to go for the 2 victory points for having built the longest road, you have to watch if anyone else is doing the same thing, because there can only be one longest road.

A game of Catan can take around 2 hours in a 4-player game. It's not a frantic game, there is no penalty for taking a while to figure out how you want to play your cards. You can keep it leisurely, or speed it up if you want to.

There are expansions for Catan such as Explorers & Pirates, Cities & Knights, Seafarers, and many more. Each one expands on the base game by adding extra mechanics. For example, the expansion Cities & Knights introduces city improvements that give various benefits to the player, and knights that protect them from invading barbarians. Expansion packs usually add game length and tactical complexity, which in turn greatly improves replayability.

There are distinct stages in the game (early, middle and end-game), which have different strategies. For example, when the game has just started out, you won't have much other options except rolling the dice to gather more resources. In contrast, the end-game is a lot more alert, because multiple players at a time can be just 1 or 2 points away from victory. The game changes between these stages fluidly, and you have to be present and engaged at all times to stay ahead.

Catan is relatively flexible in terms of the amount of players. It's recommended to be played with at least 3 players, but it is possible to work around that. There are no official rules for a 2 player game, but you can go around that by each playing two colors. The base game has 4 player slots, but people can team up, thereby increasing the number of possible players. There is also an expansion pack available, which allows for two more players to join the game without having to team up.

The constant anticipation and sense that you're working towards a goal is very pronounced. At the start of the game, you'll have limited money and resources, but as the game progresses and these resources accumulate, you can start to do more and more things each turn. Seeing your strategy slowly start to pay off as your corporation grows, and knowing you'll soon have the resources to unleash your big play helps to keep you excited for the next round.

Juggling your resources, money, and production against your opponent's actions as you try to satisfy the win conditions (getting the oxygen, temperature, and ocean coverage to their desired levels) can be pretty intense. Always having to think several turns ahead will definitely appeal to people who like a game that makes them strategize and prioritize. Choosing which cards to buy each round, what to spend your resources on, and how to terraform the planet without giving too much leeway to your opponents creates plenty of situations to outplay others.

There are over 200 unique project cards in the game that represent all of the terraforming projects available such as introducing plant or animal life, greenhouses, new buildings, and more.

Since you'll be drawing random cards in a random order each time you play, each and every game session turns into a unique experience. Even if you've seen a card in a previous session, the conditions on the board (oxygen levels, temperature, and ocean coverage) will most likely be different than the last time you saw that particular card, meaning you'll be calculating the cost vs. benefit of playing that card in a brand new way.

Additionally, each player-controlled corporation has its own specialties. Some examples are being able to substitute certain resources for money, or perhaps having an increase in production for specific resource. Each one plays dramatically different from the others, so something as simple as choosing a new corporation on your next playthrough will change your strategies.

The win condition states the oxygen, ocean levels, and temperature must reach a certain level. However, all three of these parameters are interconnected with one another, meaning you'll have to focus on all of them rather than just trying to brute force one.

For example, if you want to build a water production facility, you will need at least 2 ocean tiles in play. But in order for those ocean tiles to come into play, the oxygen and temp will first have to be satisfactory.

Overall, the game systems are very deep and complex, but the takeaway is that everything has a condition that needs to be met that is reliant upon all three parameters. This results in a very balanced experience where you need to pay heed to everything equally if you want to succeed.

There are several expansion packs which add new moons and planets for you to terraform. The rules and game flow is the same as the vanilla game, but they add new cards and corporations. The most interesting twist is that the board layouts are completely different for each expansion - with heat sources, oceans, etc in vastly different spots. They are an excellent addition that take the fun and excitement of the base game while giving you an all new playing field full of new possibilties.