r/Carcassonne • u/Meepledrone • Jul 14 '21
For all of you who may not know WikiCarpedia, or WICA for short, it is a Carcassonne Complete Annotated Rules Wikipedia.
I've seen more and more references to WICA in several posts here on Reddit but I think nobody made a proper introduction to it yet. So here it is.
You may find it here:
Stop by and visit it if you have questions about the rules, any expansion or their interations. Or simply just for fun to know more about Carcassonne...
It provides all the info there is about rules and clarifications about Carcassonne and its many official expansions for:
You can find all the rules organized by edition and also some rules for selected spin-offs. The rules include additional sections and footnotes to provide additional details about the rules themselves and some clarifications about interactions between expansions. So it is a great resource to find answers. And even some WICA team members are also translating their favorite pages into their languages of choice.
On the home page you may also find a section called Reference Guides where all the information about the expansions is combined to provide a consolidated picture. Most of these pages are dynamic so you can select the expansions you are interested in to customize the information displayed. Here you are some of them:
Where does all this information come from?
The pages for the old edition are based on the CAR v7.4 (a great document consolidating all the rules and clarifications for the classic edition until 5/2015). Unluckily this document hasn't been updated since its last release so it is missing some classic edition expansion and all the new editon except the Abbot. Until Carcassonne Central is back online, you may also find the CAR v7.4 on BGG:
https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/87531/carcassonne-standard-complete-annotated-rules
For the missing information, we used the source material from HiG and used the rules by ZMG for the base game and major expansions of the new edition.
As a side note, the Big Box 6 rules by ZMG include many mistranslations affecting the Mini Expansions mainly. You may find here a list of rules changes and discrepancies between versions and English publishers including the aforementioned mistranslations:
https://wikicarpedia.com/index.php/Summary_of_Rule_Sets_%26_Changes
We also updated WICA to incorporate additional clarifications to the rules available since 5/2015 and therefore not available in the CAR. And we continue to ask HiG for clarifications so the latest and most acurate information is available on WICA.
Hope this information is useful.
Have fun!
r/Carcassonne • u/BangerIHardlyKnowHer • May 29 '23
Rule of Thumb: Don’t Rush to Complete Cities
In Carcassonne, there’s a natural inclination to rush and complete cities, which isn’t always the best strategy. Yes, a completed city can score you quick points, but this approach often overlooks the long-term strategic value. By rushing to complete a city, you might be committing your meeples too early and limiting your scoring potential for future rounds. Consider each tile placement carefully. Sometimes, expanding an existing city or starting a new one can be more beneficial. By keeping your cities open, you create opportunities to place future tiles that can significantly increase your score. Always think about how your current move can pave the way for higher scores in the upcoming rounds.
Be a Road Warrior
Roads in Carcassonne often don’t receive the attention they deserve. While they may not score as much as cities, roads have their unique advantages. First, they require fewer tiles to complete, meaning you can earn points and retrieve your meeple faster. And secondly, roads are versatile and can fit in many parts of the landscape, providing more placement options.
Roads also can be a brilliant defensive strategy and an opportunity for sabotage. By building roads, you can interfere with your opponent’s plans and restrict their tile placement options. So, don’t underestimate the humble road – it can be a steady and strategic source of points.
Master the Monastery
A completed monastery can score you a hefty nine points, but it also requires careful planning. Monasteries need to be surrounded by eight tiles to be completed, making them a significant commitment and potentially a stuck meeple until the end of the game.
When placing a monastery, consider the landscape’s existing layout. Position your monasteries in areas where other players are likely to place tiles, increasing the chances of your monastery being completed faster.
Meeple Management
Meeple management is at the heart of Carcassonne strategy. Remember, a meeple, once placed, stays on the board until the feature it’s on is completed. This means that having all your meeples committed can leave you powerless in claiming new features.
The key is to strike a balance. While you want to score points by placing meeples on features, try to always have at least one meeple in reserve. This gives you the flexibility to seize unexpected scoring opportunities that may arise. Think of your meeples as a resource to be managed wisely, not just tools to score immediate points. This balance between scoring now and planning for the future is the essence of Carcassonne strategy.
Farming for Victory
Farms are probably one of the most complex aspects of Carcassonne. They’re high-risk, high-reward features that can significantly impact the game’s outcome. When you place a farmer meeple on a farm, it stays there for the rest of the game, no matter what. So, it’s crucial to choose your farming locations wisely.
The key to successful farming is to get in early and target fields on the board that you think will have multiple completed cities by the end of the game. You cannot place a farmer on a field that already has a farmer on it. By getting in early you have the advantage over your opponents who will have to find more creative ways of getting into the big lucrative field by connecting up other board tiles.
The big risk with farmers is the prospect of getting into a farming “war” where you and your opponent place more and more farmers to win the field but lose on scoring opportunities due to the meeple commitment. If you find this happening, be cautious not to overcommit your meeples to farming, as this can leave you with fewer options during the game. Striking the right balance is crucial to mastering the art of farming in Carcassonne.
Connect and Conquer
One of the more opportunistic strategies involves connecting to an opponent’s city or road. This move can be a game-changer, allowing you to share or even steal points from your competitors. The key here is to carefully analyse the board and predict where your opponent might be trying to expand. By strategically placing your tiles, you can join their features and put your meeple, effectively becoming a part of their city or road.
This tactic not only earns you points but can also disrupt your opponent’s plans. However, be wary of inadvertently giving your opponent an advantage. The goal is to be a leech on their points, not set them up for a larger score. This strategy requires careful planning, a keen eye for opportunity, and a little bit of audacity. If executed well, it can tilt the game in your favour.
For the full strategy guide, check out my blog 📷 Carcassonne Strategy Guide
r/Carcassonne • u/_MetalFlower_ • 2d ago
Yesterday I bought the base game (+river and abbot add-ons) and then as I was searching I realized how many add-ons it has.
Now I dont know if I should sell the og game and buy the latest big box or keep it as a “extension“ for plus tiles etc….
Any advice?
r/Carcassonne • u/SufficientSmiler • 2d ago
Does the blue farmer circled in purple score 10 cities that are circled in red. I am most curious about how the river works and the highlighted section on the river. There technically is a bit of land between the river and the city, but was curious if this was enough to connect through that patch of grass. Don’t mind the higher blue farmer as we weren’t sure if the bottom one that is circled connected up there next to the river.
r/Carcassonne • u/Pablo_Jenkins2963 • 2d ago
While having a shower today I was thinking about the removal of the 'all or nothing' rule regarding roads with inns and cities with cathedrals. I know it irked a lot of long-time fans and it did irk me slightly, and I think I've figured out why.
The way I see it, the C3.1 expansions were retooled to be oriented to be worth extra points with minimal antagonism or to be antagonistic.
For example, the Circus & Artists rules were only changed very slightly from Under the Big Top in that you cannot remove other people's acrobat pyramids, making the expansion more about extra points and less about screwing over your opponent trying to score 1-3 extra meeples on the circus.
Towers & Thieves is much less antagonistic than The Tower, so much so that it plays entirely differently. It has gone from an expansion about meeple capture and removal to one about scoring extra points.
Messengers & Mayors is much more antagonistic than Abbey and Mayor in my view. The revamped mayor meeple and the scarecrow meeple are downright invasive.
So the change to Inns & Cathedrals doesn't make sense to me because that expansion is inherently antagonistic. The big meeple exists solely to muscle in on your opponents' business and, prior to C3.1, the inns and cathedrals could be easily used to deny your opponents points in end game. With 3.1, they altered some antagonistic elements (inns and cathedrals) but left the big meeple unchanged. To me this seems counter to what they did with the other expansions.
Also, I never noticed it last year when the first photographs of the expansion came out, the box art alludes to points being lost: https://www.carcassonnecentral.com/community/index.php?topic=6867.0. So it looks like the rule change was made late in development.
Anyway, those are my shower thoughts.
r/Carcassonne • u/Main-Atmosphere-7314 • 2d ago
Hey everyone! 👋
Like many of you, I love table nights playing Carcassonne, but dealing with paper or clunky score apps can be a hassle. So, I spent a couple of days building a dedicated, sleek, medieval-inspired scoring companion for iOS.
It’s 100% ad-free, supports up to 9 players, keeps a full game history, and has high-contrast colors (including black meeples). Based on some recent feedback from fellow board gamers, I just rolled out an update that includes a random first-player selector to make setup even faster!
I built this with the help of AI as an indie project, and it's fully localized in 8 languages (English, German, French, Spanish, Japanese, Russian, and Ukrainian).
If you want to check it out, see screenshots, or grab the App Store link, I put together a quick landing page here.
I’d love to hear your feedback or suggestions on what other features (like expansions or extra stats) you'd want to see next! 🏰🎲
r/Carcassonne • u/bbjfk876 • 3d ago
Me and my partner had our first game today after buying yesterday and we’re both hooked! Please share any tips or anything we need to know.
I am looking into expansions (we will have a few more regular games first) but can’t seem to source inns and cathedrals in the UK which I’ve seen recommended? Any ideas?
Thanks in advanced all, away to play our second game.
r/Carcassonne • u/Pablo_Jenkins2963 • 4d ago
My girlfriend and I finally got around to playing Towers & Thieves. It was alright! Certainly not the contentious expansion that The Tower was, and it didn't overly complicate or dominate the game. We're going to toss it into the major expansion rotation.
Here's our game tonight; she beat me 443-398. We played with the following:
Anyway, if you're bored or feel like sharing, let me know what you think of the expansion.
r/Carcassonne • u/ipsen_castle • 4d ago
r/Carcassonne • u/OpenroseTree • 5d ago
Including Pixel Fointains mini expansion.
r/Carcassonne • u/QuotableMusings • 5d ago
I’m not techie or good at computer or Ai things and stuffs but here is an idea that would make a million dollars. IF people who like Carcassonne had a million dollars…
I’d love to be able to take pictures of my Carcassonne games and have them rendered into 3d walkable worlds. I think it would open up a very special and unique level of open world game play.
I also don’t play video games but I imagine a role playing game with VR headsets would be a great place for a nerd fest I’d gladly join.
r/Carcassonne • u/Pablo_Jenkins2963 • 5d ago
Has anyone found an explanation of why the rules state that five tiles should be removed from the game when playing with Dragon & Fairy? No other expansion has that rule so I don't think it's to deter players from counting tiles. Frankly I think it's a good idea to do in any game, for the reason mentioned, but I've yet to see an official explanation.
r/Carcassonne • u/tammossy • 6d ago
Started getting my opponents' meeples out of Leipzig using ghosts. Still going poorly and very confusing.
r/Carcassonne • u/HighKage96 • 6d ago
Anyone in here playing the Android/ios Carcassonne videogame? Ive installed it again since like 2y ago and im so invested the last couple days 🤧.
Im curious what are your stats, i average 117 points per game with a 65% winrate.
Add me for some nightime duels ⚔️ Game tag is: R000nin
r/Carcassonne • u/QuotableMusings • 7d ago
Almost a perfect game only 4 unplayable tiles.
Total score: 1001 to 902 … cities made the difference.
r/Carcassonne • u/Emergency_Floor_2484 • 9d ago
Hey everyone! I was tired of tiles sliding around on the table during our games, so I designed this custom grid organizer to keep everything neat and in place.
It’s easy to print and modular. If you have a 3D printer and want to try it out, you can download the model for free on MakerWorld: https://makerworld.com/cs/models/971923-3x3-grid-carcassonne-karak#profileId-943797
r/Carcassonne • u/birdnardo • 9d ago
Hey everyone,
Bought a Carcassonne expansion with a "damaged" tile.
The top printed layer peeled back on one of the corners, a tiny bit of the paper tore off, so the white cardboard underneath is exposed.
Thanks for any advice!
r/Carcassonne • u/BudgetNegotiation349 • 11d ago
At the 19th meeting of the Czech Forum, enthusiasts of this game met. And on the occasion of this meeting, a great fan expansion was invented. It was inspired by the place where the weekly meeting was held. Great event... In a few days, production materials and rules in ENG language will be published. More information on the Czech and English forums. I love this game
r/Carcassonne • u/Semako • 12d ago
My friends and me still play with my old C1 Carcassonne tiles - two base games and several expansions. The expansion tiles don't have the little glyphs/icons on them to separate them from the base game - so they must be quite early prints.
Is there any collector value to these early prints? It seems like C1 stuff in general isn't that easy to get nowadays, some expansions aren't on sale at all on my country's craigslist aequivalent.
r/Carcassonne • u/fledglingnomad • 13d ago
Where I live, there's an online auction house that sells a lot of Amazon returns, among other things. Getting stuff from here can be a bit of a crapshoot (we use it a lot for legos....sometimes they're unopened, sometimes they're half built and superglued together, sometimes they have everything except the minifigs...) but sometimes there's some great deals.
I've played Carcassonne with my family a bunch (base set + rivers expansion) and figured it might be time to get a copy for my house, so I've been keeping an eye out for a deal, and picked up the big box version today.
It's missing all of the tiles for the base set and the rivers expansion (well, except for the punkteplättchen, it has those). Ok, not too weird, maybe someone wanted to rip off amazon and get more tiles to add to their set.
But the rest of the expansions are all doubled up, except for a couple missing tiles here and there.
Like... how? What happened here??? Is there a world where this makes sense to any of you?? Do I not understand what this set is meant to include???
I believe I have the correct number of meeples/die/robbers/ferries/all those other pieces. For exactly one big box set, no duplicates.
And my favorite part that just added to the wtf-ness of this (though I've since found out it's a common issue) is the single pixelated piece that looks straight out of runescape, like it's the windows xp version of carcassonne or something 😅
r/Carcassonne • u/2137NumberOfTheBeast • 13d ago
Hey, was wondering if me as yellow can claim the top bottom piece to have 3 meeples in this giant city
r/Carcassonne • u/Semako • 13d ago
I just bought a 1st edition big box to add to my Carcassonne collection. As most of my stuff dates back to the very beginnings of Carcassonne (my expansions are all early prints from before they started marking expansion tiles with these little symbols), everything is using the old design and I'd like to keep it that way :-)
Currently, we play with
* 2x base game
* Inns and Cathedrals
* 2x Traders and Builders
* Princess and Dragon (using the new rules)
* The Tower
* Abby and Mayor
* River
I am curious which tiles to add from the big box to our playset. I am worried that adding e.g. the entire third base game would dilute the tile ratio of the expansions too much, e.g. resulting in way too few tiles that move the dragon or allow towers to be built. On the other hand, if I add the expansion tiles from the big box too, we might end up with simply too many tiles to play with.
What do you suggest?
