In the world of Settlers of Catan, currencies take many forms, including resources, commodities, ingredients, and various tokens. These elements form the backbone of the game’s economy, allowing players to purchase game board elements, perform actions, acquire development cards, build improvements, and ultimately earn victory points or prestige objects. Every currency introduced into the game, whether as a hand card or token, serves a clear purpose—often acting as a secondary currency to trade for the regular resources.
The classic Settlers of Catan game is based on five core resources: grain, sheep, wood, bricks (or clay), and ore. These correspond to the five main hex types on the game board. Players use these resources to build roads, settlements, cities, and to buy development cards. Over time, expansions and variants have introduced new ways to spend resources and additional currencies that deepen gameplay.
Core Resources and Their Uses
The five fundamental resources—grain, sheep, wood, bricks, and ore—remain central to Catan gameplay. Players gather these resources from hexes with specific terrain types: grain from fields, sheep from pastures, wood from forests, bricks from hills, and ore from mountains. These are necessary for constructing key elements such as roads, settlements, and cities, as well as purchasing development cards that provide strategic advantages.
Various expansions broaden how these resources can be used. For example, the Seafarers expansion adds ships, Traders and Barbarians introduces bridges, wagons, and knights errant, and Cities and Knights adds knights and city walls. Other expansions like Explorers and Pirates and Legend of the Sea Robbers include port settlements, transport ships, outposts, and even military power upgrades, each requiring resources in new ways.
The Role of Gold and Its Evolution
One of the earliest additions beyond the core resources was gold, appearing in early expansions as gold coins or a “pick your resource” hex. Initially, gold could be traded at a rate of four-to-one with the bank for other resources or three-to-one at specific harbors. Gold had various specialized uses, such as paying tolls for roads, building city walls, or participating in auctions.
In some early scenarios, such as Historische Szenarien and Die Siedler von Nürnberg, gold played unique roles. Players might pay gold to use opponents’ trading ports or construction sites, or earn gold through trading export goods along trade routes, often influenced by owning craft shops for better prices. Gold was also used to pay road tolls triggered by events.
Modern Catan expansions standardize gold coins more clearly, generally allowing players to exchange two gold coins for any one resource. These gold coins are usually earned not from special hexes but from game events or specific activities. For instance, in Explorers and Pirates, a player who doesn’t produce resources on a turn may receive a gold piece as compensation.
Certain stand-alone or themed variants, like Struggle for Rome, use gold with different exchange rates and special functions, such as financing overseas movement or buying development cards. Gold can also be earned by plundering or strategic inaction by barbarian tribes.
Variations in Resources Across Stand-Alone Games
Several stand-alone Catan variants modify or replace the standard resource set to fit their theme or gameplay style. For example, Settlers of the Stone Age replaces resources with meat, hides, bones, and flintstone from four terrain types. Settlers of America – Trails to Rails swaps bricks for coal and sheep for cattle, and includes gold coins with a two-to-one exchange rate.
Other variants like Merchants of Europe use salt gardens instead of hills and maintain the gold exchange system, while Struggle for Rome removes hill hexes entirely and introduces horses and cattle as replacements for sheep. The sci-fi-themed Starfarers of Catan redesigns resources to carbon, food, fuel, ore, and trade goods, with specific exchange rates and different functional equivalents to the original resources.
Many variants re-theme resources without altering the core mechanics, substituting almonds for wheat or whisky for grain, as seen in various geographic or fan-made editions.
Hex Types and Their Associated Resources
Across the different games and expansions, terrain hexes are linked with specific resources or commodities:
- Mountains typically produce ore or metal.
- Hills yield bricks or clay, sometimes replaced by coal or salt in variants.
- Forests supply wood or paper commodities.
- Fields provide grain, bread, or other food-related commodities.
- Pastures give sheep, wool, or meat, with some variants offering horses or cattle.
- Special hexes like gold rivers produce gold coins or bars.
- Sea and fish grounds provide fish tokens or cards.
- Other terrain types, including marshlands, jungles, volcanoes, and bogs, have been used to produce various resources or special tokens like reeds, spices, or magic crystals.
Some expansions and scenarios introduce unique hexes or multiple terrain types that allow players to choose resources based on their settlement location.
Commodities: An Extra Layer of Currency
Cities & Knights and several geographic variants introduce commodities, which act as an additional form of currency alongside resources. Commodities like paper, cloth, and metal replace the second resource usually gained when upgrading a settlement to a city. These commodities enable players to progress on special tracks—science, trade, and politics—that yield progress cards and metropolis buildings, providing extra victory points.
In geographic variants, commodities often represent secondary income generated on certain hexes and can be traded between players or with the bank. They add complexity and strategic depth, creating more avenues for trading and development.
Some fan variants introduce diverse commodities such as bread, beer, meat, spices, magic crystals, pottery, jewelry, or wine, each tied to specific hex types or expansions.
Ingredients and Their Unique Role
Beyond resources and commodities, some Catan versions introduce ingredients as a separate hand card type with distinct mechanics. For example, Die Siedler von Catan: Der Schokoladenmarkt features ingredient cards such as milk, nuts, grapes, sugar, and cocoa, produced by placing facilities on matching hexes. These ingredients can be combined into recipes, influencing demand and providing rewards.
Similarly, the Candamir board game uses ingredients like herbs, mushrooms, and honey, collected during movement, to craft potions with various effects. Ingredients often have their hand limits and can be stolen by the robber, adding an extra strategic layer.
Additional Tokens and Special Currencies
Various expansions provide unique tokens that act as currencies or objectives. The Fishers of Catan introduces fish tokens with differing values that can be exchanged for advantages. Some scenarios feature cargo tokens representing goods like sand, tools, marble, and glass, which must be transported to specific locations for victory points and gold.
Other expansions and fan-made scenarios use tokens to represent colony resources, gold nuggets, or specialized commodities, sometimes allowing players to exchange them with the bank or trade with others.
The Settlers of Catan family includes a rich and diverse array of currencies that extend far beyond the original five resources. Each currency serves a purpose—whether as a primary resource, a secondary currency, or a specialized token—and enriches the game by adding strategic complexity and thematic variety. By understanding the roles and variations of resources, commodities, ingredients, and tokens, players can better appreciate the depth and adaptability of Catan’s economic system across its many versions and expansions.
Expanding the Economic Depth: Trading and Resource Management Strategies
In Settlers of Catan, managing resources effectively is crucial to success. Beyond simply collecting grain, wood, brick, ore, and sheep, players must develop strategies to trade and use these assets optimally. Trading is a dynamic element that involves not only negotiating with other players but also using ports and special tokens to gain better exchange rates. For example, having access to a harbor can allow a player to trade two or three of one resource for another, significantly enhancing flexibility and resource acquisition.
The economic depth of the game grows as players learn when to hold onto resources and when to trade aggressively. Holding too many cards can increase the risk of losing half of them if the robber is activated, while trading too early might weaken one’s position. This balance creates a strategic tension that adds to the excitement of the game.
In addition, resource scarcity on the board varies from game to game, as dice rolls and board setup influence which resources are abundant or rare. Players often find themselves focusing on securing access to rare but critical resources like ore or brick to speed up city building and development card acquisition. Being adaptable and responsive to shifting resource availability is a hallmark of skilled play.
The Impact of Development Cards and Special Resources on Gameplay
Development cards introduce an important layer of currency-like value. While they do not represent physical resources, their acquisition requires a combination of grain, ore, and sheep. These cards can grant knights, which provide military strength; progress cards, which offer unique abilities; or direct victory points. Their strategic significance lies in how they can alter the balance of power and offer surprises to opponents.
Special resources and currencies introduced in expansions further enhance gameplay complexity. For example, commodities such as paper, cloth, and metal replace some basic resources in certain expansions, allowing players to invest in special tracks that yield unique rewards like metropolises or progress cards. These additions create alternative paths to victory and increase player interaction.
Gold coins, originally an advanced currency, have evolved to become a flexible resource in many expansions. The ability to trade gold for any other resource at specific rates provides an alternative economic pathway, helping players overcome unlucky dice rolls or strategic blockades by opponents. This flexibility can be crucial when racing to build critical roads or upgrade settlements to cities.
Unique Variations and How They Change Resource Dynamics
Several stand-alone versions of the game and fan-made variants alter the resource landscape dramatically, adding freshness and thematic depth to the core experience. For example, the Stone Age-themed version replaces traditional resources with meat, hides, and bones, shifting the focus to survival and hunting. This change not only affects the strategy but also the narrative feel of the game.
In some variants, resources are swapped with thematic equivalents that better fit their setting. The American frontier variant replaces sheep with cattle and bricks with coal, aligning the economic model with the historical context. Meanwhile, sci-fi editions replace familiar materials with futuristic resources like carbon, fuel, and trade goods, which tie directly into space exploration mechanics.
These variations demand players rethink their standard approaches to resource management, trading, and development. Adapting to new resource types, exchange rates, and building requirements keeps the game fresh and challenges veterans to rethink strategies.
The Role of Terrain in Shaping Resource Availability
The hex tiles that make up the Catan board are fundamental in determining the distribution of resources and commodities. Each terrain type corresponds to specific resource types, and the placement of these hexes influences player decisions about where to settle. Forests provide wood, hills yield bricks, mountains offer ore, fields produce grain, and pastures supply sheep.
Some expansions and scenarios add special terrain types like gold fields, deserts, or sea zones that produce fish or special tokens. These new terrain types often come with unique rules and benefits, such as producing gold coins or special commodities that can be traded or spent differently from standard resources.
Because players cannot predict the dice rolls that determine resource production each turn, positioning near diverse terrain types can provide economic stability. Players who manage to settle near several different resource hexes reduce their dependence on a single resource and become more resilient to setbacks like the robber blocking certain hexes.
Commodities as a Strategic Layer Beyond Basic Resources
Commodities add a rich strategic layer beyond the five core resources. Introduced primarily in the Cities & Knights expansion, commodities like paper, cloth, and metal replace the second resource gained when upgrading to a city. They are essential for advancing on special development tracks linked to science, trade, and politics, which in turn unlock powerful progress cards and metropolis buildings.
The use of commodities encourages players to diversify their settlements around specific resource hexes that produce these goods. This diversification provides new trading opportunities, as commodities can be exchanged among players or with the bank under certain rules. The presence of commodities deepens the trading system and adds complexity to resource management decisions.
In some geographic or fan-made editions, commodities include unique items such as spices, magic crystals, wine, or pottery. These variations introduce additional thematic flavor and alter the strategic considerations players must weigh when choosing settlement locations or trades.
Ingredients and Crafting Mechanics in Themed Variants
Some versions of the game introduce ingredients, a hand card type that brings crafting elements into play. For example, in certain thematic variants, players gather ingredients like milk, sugar, cocoa, or nuts by placing production facilities on corresponding hexes. These ingredients can then be combined into recipes that influence gameplay by generating rewards or fulfilling objectives.
This crafting mechanic adds a different economic rhythm to the game, as players must manage ingredient production alongside traditional resources and commodities. The need to collect specific ingredients encourages players to expand their network across the board or focus on particular production types, adding strategic depth.
Ingredients also often have unique rules for hand limits or vulnerability to the robber, increasing the tactical considerations during trading and movement phases. This extra currency type broadens the gameplay experience and appeals to players who enjoy resource management with an added layer of complexity.
Special Tokens and Alternative Currency Forms
Beyond resources, commodities, and ingredients, some expansions introduce special tokens that function as currencies or objectives. For example, fish tokens in certain expansions can be collected and exchanged for game advantages, adding an underwater trading aspect. Cargo tokens representing goods like marble, glass, or tools appear in specific scenarios, requiring players to transport these goods for rewards.
These tokens often create mini-goals within the main game, incentivizing players to explore new strategies such as focusing on cargo transport or fishing rather than purely on settlement building. They can be traded or used to purchase special cards, making them a flexible and valuable addition to the game’s economy.
In fan-made versions or specific expansions, tokens might represent gold nuggets, colony resources, or other specialized currencies. These often have unique rules for exchange or trading, further expanding the possibilities and complexity of the game’s economic system.
Settlers of Catan’s success lies in its layered economic system that combines basic resources with an evolving set of currencies, commodities, ingredients, and tokens. Each addition, whether in official expansions or creative variants, deepens the strategic possibilities and enhances thematic immersion.
Players who understand how these various currencies interact and how to leverage trading, resource management, and strategic placement gain a significant advantage. Whether adapting to new resource types in stand-alone versions or mastering commodity production and development card strategies, the diversity of Catan’s economy keeps the game engaging and endlessly replayable.
By exploring these elements thoroughly, players can appreciate the sophistication behind what might first seem like a simple resource-trading game, discovering a rich and flexible system that rewards creativity, negotiation, and forward planning.
Commodities as a Layer Beyond Core Resources
As Settlers of Catan evolved through expansions and variants, the introduction of commodities added a deeper layer to the game’s economy. Unlike the core resources — grain, sheep, wood, bricks, and ore — commodities function as a secondary type of currency, often associated with city upgrades or special development tracks. In expansions such as Cities & Knights, commodities like paper, cloth, and metal replace one of the usual resources gained from a city tile. These commodities are essential for progressing on unique tracks, including science, trade, and politics. Each track unlocks progress cards or special metropolis buildings, which contribute additional victory points beyond what settlements and cities alone provide.
This additional economic complexity encourages players to strategize not only around resource collection but also around commodity production and management. Commodities can be traded among players or exchanged with the bank, adding further trading possibilities and deepening interactions. In some geographic variants, commodities symbolize secondary income generated on particular hexes, reflecting regional economic specialties and enhancing the game’s thematic richness.
Ingredients and Their Strategic Importance
Some versions of Catan introduce an intriguing new type of hand card — ingredients. These elements add yet another dimension to the economic system by requiring players to collect specific items to craft or fulfill demands. For example, one variant includes ingredient cards such as milk, nuts, grapes, sugar, and cocoa, which are collected by placing buildings or facilities on corresponding hexes. Players then combine these ingredients into recipes or products, influencing market demand and unlocking rewards or bonuses. This mechanic often requires careful planning and tactical trading, as ingredients might have limited availability or unique hand limits.
In other Catan-inspired games, ingredients represent resources gathered from movement or exploration rather than production. These ingredients, including herbs, mushrooms, or honey, can be used to create potions or other valuable items. The addition of ingredients introduces unique gameplay elements, such as the risk of losing them to opponents or the robber, which forces players to balance resource gathering with defense and negotiation strategies.
Special Tokens and Their Unique Roles
Beyond resources, commodities, and ingredients, many Catan expansions and variants incorporate special tokens that act as currencies or objectives. These tokens may have a tangible value, be required for specific actions, or represent unique resources. For instance, one expansion introduces fish tokens of varying values, which players can exchange for advantages or trade for other resources. In other scenarios, tokens represent cargo or trade goods, such as sand, tools, marble, or glass, that players must transport across the board to earn victory points or gold coins.
These tokens enrich the gameplay by introducing specialized objectives and additional economic layers. Players must not only collect and manage their standard resources but also focus on acquiring and utilizing these tokens effectively to achieve strategic goals. Sometimes, tokens can be traded with the bank or among players, further expanding trade options.
In some fan-made or scenario-specific variations, tokens symbolize colony resources or precious metals like gold nuggets. These items might be exchanged at specific rates or used to finance special actions or developments. This flexibility in currency design allows each variant to tailor its economy to fit the theme and style of gameplay, ensuring that players experience fresh challenges and strategic depth.
How Commodities and Tokens Change Player Interaction
The introduction of commodities, ingredients, and special tokens significantly changes how players interact with each other. Trading becomes more complex and vital, as players negotiate not only over the classic resources but also these additional currencies. The presence of multiple types of currencies encourages more varied trade deals, alliances, and tactical exchanges. Players may specialize in collecting certain commodities or tokens to leverage trading power or to focus on specific development tracks, like the progress cards in Cities & Knights.
Moreover, managing these diverse currencies requires players to think ahead and plan their expansions carefully. Deciding when to trade commodities, save tokens, or use ingredients can impact a player’s growth and overall position. For example, focusing on commodities may allow a player to build metropolises that provide victory points and special abilities, while accumulating special tokens may help in securing rare advantages or completing victory conditions unique to a scenario.
These elements add to the richness of the game’s economy, encouraging players to diversify their strategies and to interact more dynamically throughout the course of play.
Thematic and Mechanical Adaptations in Stand-Alone Variants
Many stand-alone Catan variants adapt the economic framework by modifying resources, introducing new commodities, or implementing unique tokens that align with their thematic setting. These adaptations ensure that the gameplay mechanics resonate with the cultural or narrative backdrop of each variant.
For example, some variants replace traditional resources with ones that reflect the environment or historical period. A game set in prehistoric times might use meat, hides, bones, and flintstone as resources, representing survival essentials rather than agricultural or mining goods. Similarly, a historical-themed game could replace bricks with coal or salt, emphasizing the importance of different materials in that era.
These stand-alone versions often include gold coins or special currencies with custom exchange rates or unique functions tailored to the game’s theme. In some cases, gold serves as a premium currency used for purchasing powerful cards, paying tolls, or financing overseas expeditions. Other variants might have unique economic systems where resources must be transported or combined in special ways, increasing the logistical challenge.
Such mechanical adjustments highlight the versatility of Catan’s core economy system and demonstrate how its fundamental design can be adapted to a wide variety of settings, enhancing replayability and appeal.
Economic Strategy and Player Decision-Making
The complex interplay of resources, commodities, ingredients, and tokens in Catan enriches economic strategy and heightens player decision-making. Players must balance immediate needs with long-term goals, deciding which currencies to prioritize for building, trading, or development.
Managing commodities, for example, often involves choosing between investing in progress tracks for long-term benefits or using resources to build settlements and cities. Ingredients may require collecting specific combinations, prompting players to seek favorable trades or control certain hexes. Special tokens might offer quick advantages but require careful timing to maximize their impact.
This multifaceted economy encourages players to adapt their strategies according to the current game state, the behavior of opponents, and the opportunities presented by expansions or variants. Success depends on reading the market of available currencies, leveraging trading opportunities, and balancing resource production with development ambitions.
The Importance of Trading in Catan’s Economy
Trading is one of the core mechanics that makes Settlers of Catan unique and engaging. While the game begins with players collecting basic resources from their surrounding hexes, it is through trading that they unlock the true potential of their economic strategy. Trading allows players to overcome resource shortages, capitalize on surpluses, and negotiate mutually beneficial exchanges that can shift the balance of power on the board.
Players may trade resources, commodities, ingredients, and tokens both among themselves and with the bank or ports, which provide more favorable exchange rates. The trade dynamics evolve throughout the game, as players’ needs change with their strategies, development progress, and the expanding board situation. Negotiations can be simple one-for-one trades or more complex deals involving multiple resources or special currencies. This continuous economic interaction encourages diplomacy, alliance-building, and tactical timing.
Trading Mechanisms and Their Impact
There are several avenues for trading in Catan. Domestic trading between players is often the most dynamic, involving negotiation and sometimes bluffing or strategic withholding of key cards. Players might trade multiple resources for one critical item or barter commodities to advance their progress on special tracks. Timing and knowledge of opponents’ needs are vital to secure advantageous deals.
Trading with the bank follows a fixed exchange rate, usually four-to-one for any resource, but this rate can be improved by owning harbor settlements or cities. Harbors reduce the cost to three-to-one or even two-to-one for specific resources, which can be a game-changer in resource management. Strategic placement of settlements on harbors can facilitate resource specialization and faster development.
Some expansions introduce additional trading possibilities, such as using gold coins as a form of currency that can be exchanged for resources at better rates, or trading fish tokens and other special items unique to the expansion. This variation further broadens the trading strategy and economic depth.
Economic Interaction and Player Strategy
Trading does not happen in isolation; it deeply influences and reflects the broader player strategy. For example, a player focusing on building cities and buying development cards will need a steady supply of ore and grain. They may seek to trade wood or sheep for these critical resources or commodities. Conversely, a player aiming to control the longest road or build many settlements might prioritize acquiring bricks and wood, trading away surplus grain or ore.
Economic interaction also fosters player engagement beyond resource management. Players can form temporary alliances, trade favors, or create complex barter deals. The social aspect of trading adds excitement and unpredictability to the game, as players can use negotiation to influence opponents’ plans or block certain trades.
However, trading also carries risks. Over-reliance on trade can make a player vulnerable if others decide not to cooperate. Players must balance between self-sufficiency and active trading to remain competitive. The robber and certain event cards add tension by disrupting resource production, encouraging players to adapt their trade strategies.
Expansions and Their Influence on Trading Dynamics
Expansions and variants of Settlers of Catan introduce new elements that significantly affect trading. The introduction of commodities, ingredients, and special tokens means that players now have more diverse items to trade. In Cities & Knights, for instance, commodities are crucial for advancing on the science, trade, and politics tracks, making them highly sought-after in trades.
The Seafarers expansion brings ships and new ports, expanding the trading landscape to include sea routes and enhancing the importance of maritime resource flow. Players can trade using sea routes or position themselves near specialized harbors for better rates.
Explorers and Pirates, with its focus on exploration and cargo tokens, introduces trading goods that must be transported for points and gold, adding a logistical aspect to trading. Here, trade involves not just exchange but also movement and risk management.
These expansions deepen the trading strategy, requiring players to manage multiple resource types, currency forms, and logistics, all while interacting with other players.
Economic Strategy in Competitive Play
In competitive play, mastering the economic system and trading mechanics is vital. Players must analyze the resource distribution, evaluate opponents’ strengths and weaknesses, and anticipate moves based on trading patterns. Efficient use of commodities and tokens, combined with smart trading, can accelerate progress on special development tracks, build critical infrastructure faster, or secure rare victory points.
Competitive players often adopt flexible strategies, adjusting their trading focus depending on resource availability and opponent behavior. For instance, a player noticing an opponent hoarding a brick may trade heavily for wood to race for the longest road, denying that opponent’s progress. Alternatively, focusing on commodity acquisition and progress cards may secure a late-game victory through metropolises.
The ability to negotiate favorable trades while managing resource risk—such as robber attacks or market shortages—is a key indicator of skill. Players who balance resource collection, commodity management, and active trading often outperform those relying on straightforward building strategies.
Conclusion:
Settlers of Catan presents a dynamic and multifaceted economic system that evolves as players expand their settlements and interact through trade. From the five core resources that ground the original game to the many commodities, ingredients, and tokens introduced in expansions and variants, the game offers a complex but accessible economic framework that challenges players to strategize deeply.
Trading is the lifeblood of Catan’s economy. It enables players to overcome scarcity, adapt to changing game conditions, and engage socially through negotiation. The availability of special currencies like commodities and gold coins adds layers of strategic choices, encouraging players to diversify their focus beyond basic resource collection.
Expansions introduce thematic richness and mechanical diversity, ensuring that the economic interactions remain fresh and engaging. Whether navigating new resources in stand-alone variants or leveraging the progress tracks in Cities & Knights, players must continuously assess their economic position, plan their trades, and adapt their strategies.
Ultimately, understanding the interplay of resources, commodities, ingredients, and special tokens enriches the player experience. It offers endless possibilities for strategic depth, creative play, and social interaction, making Settlers of Catan a timeless and evolving classic in the world of strategy board games.
If you want, I can help you explore specific expansions or delve deeper into particular strategies within the game’s economic system.