Carcassonne Central

What if Carcassonne were completely developed an became overpopulated?  This expansion/spinoff allows you to leave behind the old lands, and look to the seas for new opportunities to explore and conquer.

My goals with this were:
1) To add a new look to the game.
2) To add a new theme
3) To add several new mechanics and new strategies
4) To keep the meeple count down (you only need tiles for the base expansion).

Please let me know what you think of this.  I'm really open to any ideas, with the exception of art.  I have already drawn around 160 tiles, with more on the way.  Look to the Ocean CAR thread for the latest version.

Again, this is the base expansion rules.  I have a bunch of ideas for the expansion, which is tentatively called "turbulent waters."  It has whirlpools, stranded islands, Chateau D'If, mermaids, a sea monster, and more.

Looks really good had a look at both the rules and the new tile design and like both - looks like another set of tiles to make and somewhere to store them - ouch  ;D.  Keep up the good work, will look forward with anticipation for the final product.

Some general comments:

I like the tile art, but I notice that some of the rocks are "cut" in a weird way (compare the rock in the lower centre on all the 3 tiles in the first row.  The tile in the middle is "complete" but the ones on the sides are "cut").  Do you think that could be fixed?

I think some rules examples may be needed in the rules somewhere as well, especially for the battle when 2 pirates or 2 sailors or 1 of each comes onto the same square.

Love the idea, love the artwork, but the tiles will need revisiting before releasing. Great work.

I like the artwork, but I feel the appearance of the water is not consistent with the river tiles.

I decided to set the cut brackets where they are so that there is a margin of error.  Unfortunately I didn't think of this until most of the tiles were drawn.  So, which is better; full, uncut rocks or a margin of error?  Future tiles should be ok.

There will be examples in future revisions.  Thanks for the input!

Yes.  I actually got some feedback on different art styles before finalizing these.  Nobody really liked the art style of the rivers carried over to the ocean.  If you like that art style, there is an expansion called lakes that follows that art style more exactly.  To me, the ocean should look different.  It's salt water, with algae and seaweed, so it has a different color.  It has waves and sandy beaches.  The final look for the ocean water should look very different from the mainland.  At least that was my goal.  If anyone decides to print these tiles, hopefully they will bring a new look to the board, while blending in with what we already have. Perhaps at some point I will create a river outlet for the river or fishermen expansion.

Oh and here is that sample of the ocean using original art style.  This was one of the samples I pitched to a few people.  At this point there's no going back, however.  Thanks for the feedback

Indeed, the ocean should look different, but your ocean looks too smooth to me.

Tile sheet #2 - http://www.mediafire.com/?sharekey=18d688970a740dd6a0f2f20c509059d9e04e75f6e8ebb871

reefs are now inside the brackets.  Can everyone read .png files?

The png file automatically opened in the windows fax viewer. Not sure how well it will work when it comes to printing time.

I like the formatting on the new tiles.  However, when I printed them out, the rocks were rather blur which was a pity.  Is there any way to sharpen the image?  Also, there are roads on the islands, which means one can place thieves on them and score points... I think the roads should be removed.

Ok I'll fix up the roads.  On the unclear image, I need to use a different type of file, probably.

The PDF file was clearer, but not by much.  Heh, I share your pain, but it's nice to know someone else is struggling with the tiles like I did and am doing - the idea of drawing those catacombs is giving me sleepless nights :)

P.S. Let me know if I can help in anyway!

Sorry, I hope you don't mind me doing this.  I got some images from the 2 sheets of tiles you have posted so far and made this.  I haven't printed it out yet though, so I  have no idea what sort of quality it is, but it probably won't be better than the images I got...

That looks good, except the water looks different.  Did you apply an effect to it?  When compared to all the other tiles, the water looks a bit blurred in comparison.  That might stand out.  Everything else looks good.  Sorry it's taking me so long to get these finished.

I had to do something to the water because after cutting out the islands, it was in such bad shape :(  Anyways, do let me know if there is anyway I can help.

Here is tile sheet 3.  This time in Jpeg.  It seems the quality of these sheets is improving, so I probably will go back and redo the first ones.

http://www.mediafire.com/?qmn2xmyznwm

Let me know what you think.  Is jpeg better?

JPEG is a lossy compression format. I personally prefer loss-less formats like PNG or TIF (though TIF would be way too big).

That looks great though.  I'll try printing it out over the weekend to see what sort of quality I get.

Carcassonne will just became a spin off of the setlers of catan if this ocean thing came up...

lets' try to be original.

Ok, I am game.  Explain how these two games, with entirely different mechanics, are going to collide and end up with Carcassonne being a knock off of the other. 

I am betting you can't come up with an original and defendable answer.

I've never played settlers so I don't know what you mean.  I know this won't be everyone's cup of tea.

PS heres a .tif of Ocean 3.  I'm still planning on going back and re-doing 1 and 2.

http://www.mediafire.com/?jmdegyww1vk

Your original files doesn't make it worth it to save as a tif.  The quality is the same whether you use the tif or jpg, but the jpg file is less than half the size.  I would suggest using the jpg.

Ok, I'll go with Jpeg then.  Here is #4.

http://www.mediafire.com/?zejunwnn5mw

Once I finish it all maybe there will be someone that can put it in .pdf form as the final finish.

starter tile here

http://www.mediafire.com/?nmnn3njq15n

You can convert them to PDF using the free PDF Redirect (http://www.exp-systems.com/).  I've been using that since Gantry recommended it.

What makes carcassonne, Carcassonne?  What differences are there between Carcassonne and Settlers of Catan?  I don't really know SoC well enough (perhaps Whaleyland can correct me if I make any mistakes here) but this is what I think...

Tile placement -
Carcassonne: Strategically used as part of the player's turn
Settlers of Catan: Only carried out as part of the game to create the board
Oceans: Strategically used as part of the player's turn
Conclusion: Oceans = Carcassonne

Meeple placement -
Carcassonne: As part of the turn
Settlers of Catan: Resources needed to place meeples
Oceans: As part of the turn
Conclusion: Oceans = Carcassonne

Ocean tiles -
Carcassonne: None, but game has landscape features which can be scored
Settlers of Catan: Forms the border in the base game, Harbours (expansion) allows trading of goods, Fishing Grounds (expansion) gives additional resources
Ocean: Allow movement, has landscape features which can be scored
Conclusion: Oceans = Carcassonne

Resources -
Carcassonne: None, but trade goods (expansion) used to score points at the end of the game
Settlers of Catan: Does not give any points, but required to place meeples
Ocean: None
Conclusion: Oceans = Carcassonne

Dice -
Carcassonne: None
Settlers of Catan: Determines which tile produces resources
Ocean: None
Conclusion: Oceans = Carcassonne

I could go on.  I tried looking for features where Ocean were more similar to Settlers than Carcassonne but fail to find any.  I don't see how it could be a Settler's spin-off eventhough it retains the three basic Carcassonne concepts of (1) tile placement, (2) meeple placement, and (3) scoring completed features on tiles with meeples (even more so than say, the Catapult or Princess and Dragon!).  I do agree that the 2 game have the same features (e.g. Rivers), but neither is a spin-off of each other just because they have features in common.

And this idea is original!  It adds a landscape feature not previously available in Carcassonne or any of its expansions.

Ok cool I'll try that one.  I tried "cutePDF" which seriously messed up my whole computer.  Why does Adobe cost so much?  :'(

In the starter tiles, the rocks on the beach(sand) and grass are a bit weird.  It might be worth it to run the blur tool around the edges of the rocks so that they blend in better.  Make sure not to encroach too much on the rocks (or the sand/grass) though as that will make them blurry.

Hows this for the starter?

http://www.mediafire.com/?yytmmdrewdn (http://www.mediafire.com/?yytmmdrewdn)

old here

(http://www.mediafire.com/imgbnc.php/fe6f8a6b80f1a0ac75d8ab3d6bdf42bd2g.jpg) (http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=nmnn3njq15n&thumb=5)

I get an error when trying to download that new file.

me too, 404 file not found

Hmm it works for me...

Try this one
http://www.mediafire.com/?yytmmdrewdn (http://www.mediafire.com/?yytmmdrewdn)

s'good.

Ocean 5 here

http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=znzymyyneml&thumb=5

(http://www.mediafire.com/imgbnc.php/d68776d90f88fe03c2ce6c09ad7c3c8e2g.jpg) (http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=znzymyyneml&thumb=5)

6, 7, 8

(http://www.mediafire.com/imgbnc.php/cab991ee60ce7147c2f86317052f5dc52g.jpg) (http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=yttnzhgkljm&thumb=5)

(http://www.mediafire.com/imgbnc.php/98cddc140f46e10caea1e0a7b4910e3d2g.jpg) (http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=mimtqwlmyad&thumb=5)

(http://www.mediafire.com/imgbnc.php/1fd02ed723716894153f65047a5fa0102g.jpg) (http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=z25mm1w2jzg&thumb=5)

9

(http://www.mediafire.com/imgbnc.php/6b31d5267f21cbab5dba56b5267d75492g.jpg) (http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=wilkz201yne&thumb=5)

Looks good.

and 10

(http://www.mediafire.com/imgbnc.php/ea53a24b3fd8d4ec620a79cad13d59252g.jpg) (http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=1y3zevztyrz&thumb=5)

Here is 11 with a watermark.  11 will be the last sheet in the base expansion.  I will next be putting watermarks on all the tiles and applying final touches.  Let me know if I'm missing any tile configurations, or if you would like to see more of something.

(http://www.mediafire.com/imgbnc.php/1804210b6ff54320a85a77358edafdfc2g.jpg) (http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=4kiytx1i2jh&thumb=5)

0.4 of the rules

http://www.mediafire.com/?yznuqyctjmd

Looks good, but it needs a bit of work to tighten up the formatting.  The background box is missing on page 4 and the carc central logo on the last page looks weird.  The font sizes changes within the rules is a bit confusing as well.  Also, you might want to spell things out in full instead of using the abbreviations (CoC, for example should really be the City of Carcassonne).

Also, I don't see the rules for the stand-alone part of this game... will that be separate?

Yea I'll definitely clean it up more.  The background box I was really having trouble with but I'll get all this stuff worked out before the final release.  What I'm most interested in is if the rules are clear and solid enough.  As always thanks for the support!

Here is tile sheet 12, featuring Tower foundations.

(http://www.mediafire.com/imgbnc.php/2cb7fe087fe9af822ef57bf2a9484f9d2g.jpg) (http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=inmdfqyvjew&thumb=5)

And here is version 0.5 of the rules. 

http://www.mediafire.com/?ktcwmeglzmi (http://www.mediafire.com/?ktcwmeglzmi)

It feels pretty close to being done so let me know if anything needs to be tightened up.  Thanks!

OK, here goes my turn at proofreading.

General: The punctuations are funny.  TM is showing up instead of " for example.

General: "meeple" is a fake word.  The official rules do not use that term.  The word "follower" is used instead (or pig or builder or barn when referring to non-follower meeples).

Page 1:

Comment: Normally we type the title (below the Carc logo and above the a carc expansion by...) with all caps

Preparation does not mention what happens to the normal starting tile if playing with Oceans.  Preparation also does not mention what happens when playing with Rivers.

I have no idea how an ocean can be turned perpendicular to the starting tile as mentioned in drawing of an ocean tile.  Do you mean that the beach cannot be made to turn direction instead?

Page 2:

Comment: It might be nice to move the starter tile graphic to the preparation section and then indicate it in the text with "starter tile (see below)"

Comment: It's a bit confusing to say that oceans are like grassy farms.  It might be less confusing to say that oceans are a new landscape feature.

Comment: I would separate out the farmer/follower analogy when talking about the oceans as a separate section.  That would make it clearer.  The official rules usually have it in two separate sections, i.e place a tile, then followed by place a follower.

Comment: Movement isn't a new mechanic.  Wagons can move, the dragon, count and fairy can move.

Comment: Features may not be played upon (whatever that means) until discovered?  So you can't play onto cities or farms like normal?  Or is this only for features in the ocean?  What about reefs and the ocean and the harbours themselves?

Comment: It would be nice to have a picture of the harbour tile near the sailing section. (Apologies if there is one already there in the example, but the image doesn't appear on the version I downloaded)

Comment: Urgh I'm confused by page 2 alone.  It would be nice to state near the beginning of the deploy a follower stage that followers can be:
a) deployed to the harbour as a sailor.  Two sailors on the same harbour forms a fleet.
b) deployed to the reef as a pirate
etc.
and then logically describe each one of the mechanics for each of the different type of followers.

Comment: Move the wood still not defined.  I use the move verbose "instead of placing a follower" with a footnote that states "or any other actions that may be carried out instead of placing a follower" or something like that.

Comment on 5th line of Sailing: "You may choose to just move 1 tile"  <-- this is confusing.  Why is there a statement talking about moving tiles when it's about moving followers?

Comment on Sailing: It might be better to have a table showing the cost of each move.

Comment: Only 1 colour of follower on an ocean tile?  So a sailor cannot move into an ocean tile where another player has a pirate on a reef?  Or do you mean only 1 colour of follower on the ocean segment of an ocean tile?

Can't comment on the example because the image is not shown on the version I downloaded.

OK, I think I'll stop for now.  However, page 3 and 5 are missing the blue background boxes (just copy and paste those boxes into the correct page).

I can't download from the last link provided, but from version 0.4:

Cover page: 'A fan-made expanion to Carcassonne', needs to be 'expansion' ;)

Thanks for the feedback guys it will really add some polish!

0.6 many revisions and new diagrams and examples.

get it here:
http://www.mediafire.com/?sharekey=18d688970a740dd6a0f2f20c509059d903fac10b224880655621d66e282a0ee8

or here
http://www.mediafire.com/file/tmqy2hjjont/Ocean 0.6.doc

or here
http://www.mediafire.com/?tmqy2hjjont

Sorry, not sure which ones will work for you.  Let me know what needs refinement, thanks. As soon as I finish this I'll start on the expansions which should make this much more interesting!

OK, here we go again.  As usual, bold = add, strikethrough = delete.  I hope I'm not being too harsh...

General: Check your spacing before and after headings, they are not even.

General: How many starter tiles are there, one or more than one?  Pick either "starter tile" or "starter tiles" and use it consistantly in the document.

General: "Move the wood" is not mentioned anywhere in the rules.  I generally don't use the term and use "instead of playing a follower, or any of the actions associated with playing a follower" or something like that.  If you want to use it, please define what the term means.

Note: The wagon is considered a follower.  So this expansion doesn't introduce follower movement!

Header: The "T" in The Ocean is not capitalised.  I have no idea if this is intentional or not.

Page 2:

My MS Word shows a box instead of ... at the end of the story (i.e. after "The ocean is not for the feint of heart").  Not a major issue, unless I'm PDF-ing the document!

Text justification needed  on the extra pieces bullet points

Preparation: (Suggestion) Would it not make more sense to talk about placing the Starter tile, then shuffling "the remaining" or "the other" tiles with the rest of the tiles?

My MS Word shows the starter tile on the 3rd page.  It would look better to either (i) adjust the spacing on Page 2 so that the starter tile fits on Page 2, (ii) adjust the size of the starter tile so that it fits on page 2, (iii) a combination of (i) and (ii) or (iv) move the heading to Page 3.  Your choice.

Page 3:

Drawing an Ocean Tile: When a player draws a tile which depicts with the Ocean (or Reef) on any side, he must play it on the ocean side of the map, OR extend the starter beach.   If extending the starter tiles, you may not place a tile so that it turns the beach perpendicular to the starter tiles.  The beach should generally be stretched extended in a straight line.

The Ocean:

"The Ocean is new,"  --> No it's not.  The Oceans are older than your mom :)  I think you mean "The Ocean is a new landscape feature,"

"and the most common feature in this expansion" --> Do you really have to mention this?  It's like The Tower mentioning that tower foundations are the most common feature in this expansion.  I think it's superfluous.

"Mechanically," --> Whoa, it has wheels and an engine?  No?  Machines?  No?  Then it can't be mechanically anything :)  The original Carc rules do not use the term "mechanic" or "mechanical" or "mechanically".  I think this word can be deleted from the rules.

"it plays the same" --> is probably how one would say it, but it is bad written English.  "It is played the same way" is that phrase in full.

And reading through the rest of the section just got me more confused.  What are fishing zone?  What do you mean by "sailed".  It is confusing.

My suggestion for this section:

"The Ocean is a new landscape feature, some of which may have the following:"
{picture of reef}
Reef
{picture of fishing zone}
Fishing Zone
etc. etc.

I would scrap the analogy with the farmers because that's just confusing, i.e. You don't start the farmer at a barn and "sail" a farmer out to a field to deploy them.  In fact, I won't even talk about the followers in this section.  Since this section is shortened, I would move it before "Drawing an Ocean Tile" and it nicely introduces what is an ocean tile, before talking about drawing it and playing it.

I would create a new section after this, which would be the equivalent of "2. Place a follower" (since "Drawing an Ocean Tile" is equivalent to "1. Draw a tile").

The text would be something like:
When the player has placed the Ocean tile, he or she may do the following actions:
1. Deploy a follower to the harbour
2. Sail
3. Deploy a follower to the reef
etc. etc.
and then restructure the sections below such that it follows this order.  I would advice against making reference to cloisters, roads, etc. as that's just confusing.  (They are similar, but not exactly the same)

And after all that has been describe, add the equivalent of "3. Score a completed XYZ" and then "Scoring at the end of the game" and you should be set!  Good job so far, I like how this is shaping up!

Thank you so much for that detailed reply.  You know I'll put it to good use!

Thanks again, my comments in RED.  Here is the updated version: http://www.mediafire.com/?ynmnyudncmk

I'm not sure if it's addressed in this thread or if you read the one where it is, but what do you think about using the ships from Catan as the followers for these tiles?  Also, how about The Pirate (i.e. The King and Robber Baron).

Yea I definitely thought of this before.  The way I see it there are benefits and negatives for doing that.

The benefit is that it would look better an fit the theme better.

The negatives are many:
-More meeples to buy and store
-How do you know which ones are sailing, fishing, and pirating? 
-Follower management is a large part of this game.  If you say each player gets 2 boats then that is as large as your fleet can get.  It would then be difficult to establish any sort of dominance on the Ocean.  On the other hand if you gave every player 8 boats then the follower pile would be that much bigger.  The basic idea behind the ocean is that you are risking more with greater point potential.  With 8 boats follower management becomes much less of an issue.

All that being said, I'm trying to create a high quality expansion that really brings something new and looks good.  Maybe in my next version I will write up some optional rules for boat meeples.  I think it would look better, for sure.  Thanks

On those boats, boardgamebits has them...

Also, there will be future expansions that put an ocean twist on current expansions such as King & Baron.  I will need some art for the pirate leader and the governor.

Please make sure you have the rights (or agreement from the artist) for Carc Central to distribute those images.  Otherwise, we can't host it here.

Yea that's basically what I'm looking for.  I'm hoping that some talented person will be up for drawing a couple pictures for this.  Otherwise there might not be a King & Robber Baron type expansion for this.

I think it's better to post the answer here...

I tested it one time (photos later), very difficulty the rules. Many things were not clear after reading the rules several times.

Examples are the parts: Placing wood on Islands (where to put after sailing to it, what if there is a town (owned by other player?) on the tile you've sailed to (can I go to the Island or do I have to sail around the towntiles?)), who is allowed to use which harbours and when...

Reefs often makes it very difficulty to place tiles, because they often do not fit.

All the rules with the fleets and the fighting - that was too much, we left them out.

And the flow chart - the issue "check follower on island" - here I expect results and instructions for the results - e.g. YES - arrow to... NO - arrow to...

My feeling was - there are less tiles with water on 3 edges - it was not easy to get islands...

I hope these comments will help you for your work on that nice expansion, because I like many parts on it  :)

Comments in red.  Thanks for the feedback.  I fully intend on refining this until it is easy for all to understand.  Basically until you see 'Rules 1.0' consider this a beta test.  That being said, the tile sheets are finalized and I need lots of feedback from playtesters.  Here is a full package download with all finalized sheets (with watermarks on all pages) and rules up to .61: http://www.mediafire.com/?mgx2yydmozz

Yes that is true, you can also see it here :-)

http://www.carcassonnecentral.com/forum/index.php?topic=748.msg9632#msg9632 (http://www.carcassonnecentral.com/forum/index.php?topic=748.msg9632#msg9632)




The photos are on my girlfriends cam, i will post them later, no problem..




This was very clear :-) You should add this to tre rules.

Tobi

OK, here are my comments on the fixes:

To explore the Ocean, as your entire “move the wood”  phase of your turn, place a follower on a harbour  tile.

1. It's bad English to start a sentence with the preposition "to"
2. The footnote is incorrect.

A better way to say it would be:
During your turn, after playing a tile, and instead of playing a follower to the tile, or or any of the actions associated with playing a follower, you may explore the ocean by playing a follower to:
1. the harbour that was just played.
2. any harbour that is already in play.

I have no idea whether it's 1 or 2, and the rules doesn't say.

Here's my suggestion of how to structure the (current) next 2 sections after the Starter tile (bold = proposed additions, strikethroughs= proposed deletions):


and then the following sections so that it "flows" according to the numbered list I had above in Deploy a follower above:

Reefs
Harbours
Sailing
Fleets
Ocean Challenge
Islands
Governor's Mansions

And then everything from Final Scoring is fine (with the exception that I had no blue background on the last page, but it's probably a display thing)

Edit:I hope that helps.  Once it's structured in a sensible way that's easier to read without jumping all over the document, then we can go through the nitty gritty again :)

Thanks again for the comments.  I will pour over them in greater detail, but I just wanted to mention there is no "deploy a follower" in the Ocean, at least in the traditional sense.  You must sail to whatever you want to claim.  You only deploy to harbors.  You then must sail (in subsequent turns)to whatever you want to claim.  (This is why the Ocean is weighted heavier in VP: it takes longer to claim anything)If your sailor has landed on an Island, you now have access to a mini game of Carcassonne where only those that have landed on the island may play, perhaps only 1 player.  So if you have a sailor that has landed on an island, and you extend the island by placing a tile, you could deploy a follower to the road,farm, or city using traditional rules.  You could not deploy to any ocean or reef segments on that tile because your sailors couldn't have arrived there yet.  Maybe I need better examples...

It doesn't matter whether there is a deploy a follower or not in the expansion.  The rules have 3 steps:

1. Draw a tile
2. Play a follower
3. Score

You do have actions that are carried out instead of playing a follower.  Those needs to be made very clear what they are.  Also, as you pointed out, there is one action that deploys the follower to the harbour.  So if that is the first action, then you start describing from there so that the document "flow" is sequential and logical (you only talk about sailing or islands, for example, after talking about deploying to harbours.

I thought of some other ideas.  I know you've got so much of this figured out and I don't want to throw a monkey wrench into the works, but I thought I'd put it out there for you to consider.  What if instead of a Pirate (King/Baron) tile, it was something like an Admiral or "Sea Captain". 

As for using ships and telling them apart, what if you did away with the Pirate as a follower and made it one neutral meeple that worked like the Dragon or the Big Bad Wolf from the Fairy Tales?  Perhaps it could even work something like the Leper and merely take points away instead of removing the followers.  Or, you could even have it work similar to a tower and have it capture other followers.  Not to sound too much like Catan, but you could make it a black ship meeple (maybe even with a nifty little Union Jack on it).  There are a couple of different larger ship tokens out there I've seen that you could use to differentiate the pirate ship from the black set of followers. 

I've been communicating with Mr. Storbeck from that German fan site about his lake set and we also discussed the issue of how many ships to have.  I think we agreed that if you play with the regular tiles as well, you'd probably need to add followers or you would have too few to play on the land tiles.  My suggestion was that you have 1 ship follwer for every 12-15 tiles of Lake (Ocean). 

Perhaps I misunderstand, the Ocean is meant to be an expansion, not a spin-off, right?

Comments in red.

Also, here is a list of expansions that I will make after the base rules are finalized:
-Nessie and Mermaid (Maybe Krakken and mermaid)
-Chateau D'If (my favorite)
-Turbulent waters (with warp pools, stranded islands, Hurricanes (tiles played like abbeys, different effects), and vagabond sailors)
-Treasure Hunt Ocean (with permission)
-"Master and Commander" & "Pirate Lord" (King scout for Ocean)
- Ocean & Island trade
- and more.

Nice.  The shot where he's holding a rigging line and leaning over the side.

I'll have to try and remember where I've seen that.  It might take me a few days to get an opportunity.  My web activity is limited where I am (I'm very pleasently surprised I can access this site). 

Agreed, sounds great to me.  I'm excited that you like the ship idea. 

Sweet!  I like Krakken better, maybe even Leviathan (sp?).

Sounds great!  No idea what it would look like, but I love the concept!  :D

Of course!  A must...

Sorry it took so long, but here's what I've found for ships...

You can get the regular ships from Catan from THIS (http://bedi-spielematerial.eu/index.php?cat=c1_Catan-Pieces.html&XTCsid=12f9ec38f1921edbbd079cc7d1a0f60c) site, although, there are probably lots of places to get them.

There are several different ships/boats HERE (http://www.spielmaterial.de/english/index.html?d_P0015_Carcassonne_Figures1992.htm), but they are not standard Carcassonne colors.

This is the best I can do for now.  I hope it's somewhat helpful.

Cool thanks.  My computer is down so my work on this is on pause at the moment.

How's your computer doing?  Have you gotten a chance to do any more work on the Ocean?

I just got my new one.  Hopefully I'll get a chance to work on this within the week.  Thanks for the interest!

Just a comment on the name of this expansion (which I fully support, by the way)...since Carcassonne isn't actually adjacent to an "Ocean", shouldn't this expansion be called "The Sea", as in the Mediterranean Sea? It doesn't have to be, but one of the main concerns of the expansions is to be roughly historically accurate and since Carcassonne is not near an ocean, this expansion is somewhat inaccurate. Just a concern. Cheers.

You make a good point.

Hmm I see your point.  As a counter point, I would say that while part of France borders the Mediterranean sea, it also borders the Atlantic ocean (though Carcassonne IS closer to the Mediterranean).  As for historical accuracy, we do have fairies and dragons in an official expansion.  I plan to further explore mythology in the expansions. 

I might change it in the future, but it would mean new artwork for the cover art and it also might be confusing to people that know this as "the Ocean".  I guess I'll have to think on this a bit more. 

By the way, my next set of rules will be adding some big changes, including boat meeples, combat changes, and a wind element.  I'm going to re-visit the tiles as well...

Also a good point.  It is just a name. 

True, although I would argue that the mythological elements don't count since they still, sort of, encompass the feeling of medieval-ness. But it is true that an ocean does touch France and since technically the Mediterranean Sea is a branch of the Atlantic Ocean, I guess you can call it an ocean.  ;)

Somewhat related to your point, I think an expansion that works with the Reconquista (which is why Carcassonne was founded as a county to begin with) would be quite historically fun. But trying to work that out plus the rather anti-Muslim tone of it may not make it so politically correct.

Drumroll please!

Version 0.7 is here!  There are TONS of changes to everything here.  Tile changes, rule changes, new art, etc.  Sorry about the large file, but I want to make sure I preserve this in a loss-less format.  I'm really hoping this is close to a release version.  So please, give me feedback and council here.  I'm more excited than anyone to put 1.0 up there!

I reduced the number of tiles needed so that people will be able to make this easier.  The old tiles will be added back in later with expansion features.  For now I just want it to feel fresh and simple.  Though its still over 100 tiles...  Hopefully I have included past comments in my revisions but let me know if I missed something.

So, without any further adu, Here it is:

http://www.mediafire.com/?ni1nggggq5j

There are some formatting issues (different font and font sizes, footnotes not justified, etc.), typos, and the usual American vs British English, but I guess that can be fixed up immediately prior to the release version.

Page 1: "Place a tile - move wood - score" would be more accurately defined as "Place a tile - Deploy follower - score".  Note that RGG does not use the term "move wood".
Page 2: Question: Can a non-Ocean tile be used to extend an island?  If not this needs to be stated in footnote 6.  If so, then the statement that you cannot play non-Ocean tiles to the Ocean side is erroneous.
Page 3: Does the free move with wind count as your 1 free move per turn or is it in addition?

Also, the document structure is still a little "out of whack".  I feel that Ocean Deployment section should be before The Ocean & fishermen, so that the document "flows" better.  It would be better structured as:
Ocean Deployment
Harbours
Fleets
Sailing
Winds
Reefs
Ocean Sailing example
Ocean Challenge
The Ocean & fishermen
Island
Govenors
Govenor Mansions
Final Scoring

Anyways, keep up the good work.

Is anyone else having trouble downloading this file? My virus scanner is currently blocking everything on the mediafire.com website saying that it has been identified as dangerous.

I don't know what to tell you.  It has worked just fine for me.  Since anyone can upload anything to that site, your virus scanner blocked the site with good reason.  You just have to trust me.  :)s

What do you think about the content changes like the wind and simplified combat rules and so on?

I think the free move is a good idea.  I also think that the wind is another good idea if it gives an additional free move.  However, I think the picture for wind could be better (perhaps like a gust of air or a cloud with eyes and a mouth blowing air out of its mouth) than the triangle.  The triangle though isn't bad and if that's what you're settling for, I would have no complaints about it.

I like the simplified combat rules as well, I think, but I would need to play a few games with it to get the hang of things.  Combat though really isn't a Carcassonne thing, but it works for your expansion, so I say keep it by all means.

I think Islands can be eliminated completely from this expansion.  What used to work for the previous expansion is that normal carc tiles can be added to islands.  Now that they can't, well, Islands are a bit superfluous and can probably be an expansion on their own.  Taking out islands would probably take out Governor's mansion as well.  I know these are supposed to be the cloister equivalents (sort of) for oceans though, but I also don't think that would be a good reason to include them in here (because you can actually do them justice in a future expansion).

The new rules also state that ships cannot share the same ocean space, except at harbours.  I think it might be good to have like a seawall thing on the border of the sea side of the harbour tile, but a little bit inside so that there is still some water between the wall and the edge of the tile.  This would separate the waters of the harbour from the waters of the other tile and make it immediately more visible that there can be more than one ship on that tile.

comments in red.  Thanks very much for the input!

I'm not too sure about the islands, but I agree with what you've said for everything else.  Ultimately this is your expansion/spin-off after all, so go along with what you want and what you think will be good for the expansion/game.  It's looking good so far.  All you have to do is to polish up the rules further and it'll be ready for public downloads.

Here's version 0.71.   http://www.mediafire.com/?mi1zgtnjzef

Mostly simple revisions, but also included are some rules for playing with official expansions.  Let me know what you think.  Ready for 1.0?

Looks good.  Now all that has to be cleaned up is the formatting.

As for the new section, you might want to state "The pig and the builder" or "The big follower" or "The wagon and the mayor" instead of "New followers".  BTW, neither the pig or the builder is a follower.
Fairy: Can it be moved to an ocean space - the rules say nothing about that.
I would also change "catapult fire" to "seduction/knock-out tokens".

I'll go through it in detail when I have the time.  Keep up the good work.

What formatting needs clean up?

Sorry for the delay.

Cover: The word "expansion" is misspelt in the bottom right hand corner.

Page 2 Story: "sailboat" is one word (ditto for the rest of the document).  The phrase "faint of heart" is spelt with an "a"
Page 2 Extra pieces:  "mansions" might be better as "Governor's Mansion" because that's how you describe them below.
Question Page 2 Preparation 2nd sentence: Is this done in turn order, or is it a free for all?
Page 2 Preparation 3rd sentence: The n[sN[/s]ormal ocean rules apply, so only the harbour spaces may hold boats of multiple colours may only be deployed to the harbour spaces.
Page 2 Preparation: "Carcassonne City" should be "City of Carcassonne"
Question Page 2 Preparation: Is the City of Carc placed adjacent to the beach (i.e. on the ocean side?) or adjacent to the starter tile on the land side?

Page 3 Drawing an Ocean tile: comma missing between the words tile and which in the 3rd sentence.  "You" would be better if changed to "A player" (Ditto for the rest of the document).  Decide on whether the initial O in Ocean should be capitalised and stick with it (use either Ocean or ocean in the middle of a sentence.  If it's the initial word, the first O should be capitalised as per normal English grammar).
Page 3 Ocean Deployment: Insert the word "the" as the second word between Unlike and Carcassonne.  I think you can delete the sentence "Most claiming in the ocean is done by sailing, not by normal deployment." as it is described in the previous and next sentences.  Decide on whether you want "1 move, 2 moves, etc." or "one move, two moves, etc." and stick with that for the rest of the document.
Page 3 Harbours: Paragraph needs to be justified.  "hold more than one colour of followers" would be better phrased as "contain followers of more than one colour".  "water" is a bit ambiguous - "ocean space of the harbour tile" would be better.
Page 3 Fleets: meeples should be changed to followers (ditto for the rest of the document).  color should be colour.  the "A" in "as" within the parenthesis should be a small-letter "a".  And I just read through this have decided I'll change my mind.  The Fleets section actually works better after the Wind section (so Harbours, then Sailing, then Wind, then Fleets).  (Reminder to self - try to read through everything before making suggestions on the forum)
Page 3 Sailing: Good :)

Page 4 general: 2 background boxes - one of them should be deleted.
Page 4 Winds: Good  :D
Page 4 Reefs: Reefs are closed by large rocks, as seen in the example here.  Replaced the word closed there with "depicted" or something similar.  "waters" = "ocean space"?

Page 5 Ocean Challenge example (first paragraph): "Its reds turn" should be "It is red's turn".  "fisher boat" should be "fishing boat"?  "was reds" should be "is red".  The word "The" is missing before the first word of the sentence "Same colour boats may always share the same tile."
Page 5 Ocean  example(second paragraph): "He also can" is bad grammar - "He can also" would be good grammar.  "White" should be "While"
Page 5 Ocean Challenge: No comments  ;)
Page 5 Ocean Challenge Simple rules: reserve should be supply (ditto for the rest of the document).
Question Page 5 Ocean Challenge Advanced rules: Pirates draw 2 tiles for each pirate or reef tile, or ???

Page 6 The Ocean & fishermen: landmass is one word
page 6 Islands: The owner of the island, called the governor, is the player with a follower on that island's feature which has the most points the most valuable feature, owned.
Page 6 Islands example: This completes the island and yellow deploys his pig to the tile just played. As his ‘move the wood’ he places a pig.  The bold text - "island completes" would be better as "island is completed".  The example might be better moved to after the "govenor's section".

Page 7 Governors: See above regarding dittos
Page 7 Governors Mansions: Apostrophe missing in the title.  The last sentence regarding the interaction with the Count of Carc may be deleted as it is explained below.
Page 7 Final scoring: Paragraph needs to be justified.
Page 7 Playing with official expansions RI&II: I would delete the "Future expansions may include deltas." sentence.  We don't know what HiG/RGG will release next ;)
Page 7 Playing with official expansions I&C: New followers?  Is it just the "Big follower"?
Page 7 Playing with official expansions T&B: New followers?  There are no followers in T&B, only the pig and the builder.
Question Page 7 Playing with official expansions P&D: Why can't the dragon fly over the ocean?
Page 7 Playing with official expansions Tower: How about over islands, or over a mixture of water and land?  Would it be better to keep the tower the same as normal and introduce a lighthouse piece (paint a tower piece white?) instead?
Page 7 Playing with official expansions A&M: I would use "The mayor, wagon and barn" instead of just "New followers to be more precise.  Abbey tiles may not be played on the Ocean side?  (Abbey tiles cannot be used on anything usually)
Page 7 Playing with official expansions CoC: sentence needs to be justified.
Page 7 Playing with official expansions Catapult: How about seduction?

Page 8 Version History: ver 0.4 has 2oo9 instead of 2009 like the rest.

Phew.  I don't think I got everything, but that should be the majority of it.  Have fun revising it to 1.0 for public downloads!

Thank you very much for the thorough critique!  There are two reasons the dragon can't fly over the ocean: 1) Can he fly?  He can't get into the city of Carcassonne.  2) In a future expansion of mine there will be a new roaming threat to the ocean.  Also, in the first expansion I'm adding back in the expanding islands rules.  At that point, you could put a volcano on an island and send him over there.  But he will be stranded...

As for the tower, it would be too easy to stay out of the firing lines on the ocean.  By giving it wider range on the ocean it makes the towers harder to avoid.  Of course, theres nothing stopping one from writing a lighthouse variant that has white tower blocks.

Abbeys to me only fit over land.  It wouldn't match the weathered beaches of the ocean.  I'm planning on a future expansion that will add in tiles that fill gaps.

And here is version 0.72.  It is hopefully a contender for 1.0!

http://www.mediafire.com/?uawjmwxaznx

Quick lookthrough for errors:

General: There are still multiple occurances of "you" instead of "a player" in the document.  Use the search and replace function in Word to replace them?
General: Are the letters "G" and "M" capitalised in Governor's Mansion?  If so, please ensure that all occurance of it in the document are capitalised.

Page 2 Story: "faint of heart" is still incorrectly spelt as "feint of heart"
Page 2 Preparation: "Take turns doing this." in what order?  Turn order?  Randomly?  Whoever gets there first?
Page 2 Preparation: The word "The" missing from the front of the 4th sentence which goes "Normal Ocean rules apply,..."

Page 3 Drawing an Ocean Tile: There is a revision bar to the left of the last line in my view.  I have no idea if that appears in your view, but if it does, it needs to be removed.
Page 3 Ocean Deployment: There are 4 spaces before the sentence "Reefs are claimed by sailing."  Your normal number of spaces between sentences is 2.
Page 3 Fleets: Needs to be moved to after the Winds section (Pg 4)?

Page 4 Reefs 1st para: Delete the sentence "Reefs are closed by large rocks, as seen in the example here." as  it's a duplicate of the 2nd sentence of the paragraph.
Page 4 Reefs 2nd para: "Put him into adjacent waters." - waters would be better rephrased to "Ocean space" to make it common with the phrasing used in Harbours (pg 3).

Page 5 General: Two background boxes.  One of them needs to be deleted.
Page 5 Ocean sailing example: "reds options" in the first sentence is missing an apostrophe i.e. red's options.  Ditto with "reds turn" in the 3rd sentence, i.e. red's turn.

Page 6 The Ocean & fishermen: landmass is one word

Page 7 General: missing background box
Page 7 Islands: "your" needs to be changed to "a player's" as well.  Please remember the apostrophe :)

Page 8 Playing the Ocean as a spinoff (stand alone): The whole section needs to be justified

Page 9 General: Background box missing

As for the tower, it would be too easy to stay out of the firing lines on the ocean.  By giving it wider range on the ocean it makes the towers harder to avoid.  Of course, theres nothing stopping one from writing a lighthouse variant that has white tower blocks.[/quote]I think you misunderstood my question.  The way you have currently written it is:

"Lighthouses also may capture diagonally over water (up to 8 directions), but still only horizontally and vertically over land."

So let's say I have a lighthouse 2 tiles from the beach.  I place a tower piece to make a 6 piece tall tower.

Let's say the map looks something like this:
(T = lighthouse tower, O = ocean, B = beach, L = land tile, 1 = follower for question 1, 2 = follower for question 2, 3 = follower for statement 3, 4 = follower for statement 4, 4 = follower for statement 4).

1. Can I capture a follower that's 5 diagonal tiles (2 Ocean, 1 beach, 2 land) away?
2. Can I capture a follower that's 3 diagonal tiles (2 Ocean, 1 beach) and 3 horizontal tile (3 land) away?
3. We know that the tower can capture a follower that's 5 horizontal tiles (2 Ocean, 1 beach, 2 land) away and that is allowed by the current statement in the Ocean rules.
4. We also know that tower can capture a follower that's 5 vertical tiles (5 Ocean) away and that is also allowed by the current statement in the Ocean rules.

The current statement in the Ocean rules will not allow 1, but will allow 2 (and 3 and 4).  Hence my statement that it might be better to not let towers capture diagonally - otherwise, you'll have to write an entire paragraph about it.  However, you are free to also write a paragraph.  You might also want to put a footnote that the beach tile is considered to be Ocean (i.e. diagonal allowed) or Land (i.e. diagonal not allowed) if you are writing the paragraph.  And then you'll probably need an example of some sort since you're adding a new rule.

1 is not allowable because you can't capture a land follower diagonally.  2 is not allowable because it is not lined up vertically, horizontally, nor diagonally.  It has to line up exactly.  A follower on a beach tile could be on land or ocean.  It depends on which part of the tile the follower is residing.

I have tried to include all your comments in the following revision: 0.73!

http://www.mediafire.com/?dzfyzmntywn

Just noticed one small error so far:

  Page 3, note 8: “Harbors” should be spelt "Harbours"

Who says that's a spelling error. In Britain, harbours is the only way to spell it. Ya need the diphthong!

I only mentioned for the sake of consistency, since all of the other cases were spelt using the British 'harbours' rather than the American 'harbors'.

djdahmer, I think both of you are saying the same thing:


And a quick lookthrough:

Page 2 and 8: Governor's Mansion missing the apostrophe.

Page 3 Winds: "sailboat's movement" is incorrect spelt as "sail boats movement"
Page 3, note 8: see djdahmer's comment.

Page 4 Reefs 1st para: Delete the sentence "Reefs are closed by large rocks, as seen in the example here." as  it's a duplicate of the 2nd sentence of the paragraph.  There is also a grammatical mistake with that sentence, but I can't rephrase because I'm not sure what you're trying to say if it's not "depicted by rocks".

Page 5 General: Two background boxes.  One of them needs to be deleted.

Page 7 General: missing background box.

Page 8 General: Two background boxes.  One of them needs to be deleted.
Page 8 The Tower: "Lighthouses also may" should be "Lighthouses may also"
Page 8 A&M: needs to be separate from The tower.

Page 9 General: missing background box.  Also, do you mean for this page to just have the carc central logo?

Question: How can I use a big follower, pig, builder, etc. to settle an island?  Is it only after my first "normal man follower" has reached the island, then during subsequent turns, when I extend the island, I can play anything from my hand (according to the normal rules, of course).

OK hopefully all these concerns are addressed in version 0.8.  Get it here:

http://www.mediafire.com/?2mn1dzdutjk

On the follower question, any follower type can be used to mark or claim on islands.  Since pigs and builders are not followers, they can't be used in that way.  I tried to fix this but let me know if it still needs clarity.

Page 3 Footnote 3:sailboat is one word
Page 3 Footnote 5: Didn't you just add the ability to use land tiles on islands in this expansion?

Page 4 Reefs 1st para: Delete the sentence "Reefs are closed by large rocks, as seen in the example here." as  it's a duplicate of the 2nd sentence of the paragraph.  There is also a grammatical mistake with that sentence, but I can't rephrase because I'm not sure what you're trying to say if it's not "depicted by rocks".

I still see 2 background boxes on pages 5 & 8 and no background boxes on 7 & 9, but that may be because of my word processor

Page 6 Islands: Once the player settles the island with a normal ‘man’ follower, that follower now serves as the a marker and the boat is returned to the player’s reserve.  For each island, only players that have landed on it may settle it.  If multiple players are settlinges the same island, the normal (land) Carcassonne rules apply inside on the island.  Additionally, on an island, a landed boat follower that has landed may be exchanged with any other type of follower for free, so as long as it follows complies with normal follower placement rules.  Theis exchange may be carried out happen when you a player extends the island with a new tile.  The exchanged follower goes back to a player's supply, while the new follower goes onto the new tile.

Page 8: Governor's Mansion still missing the apostrophe.
Page 8 A&M: needs to be separate from The tower.

Thank you for your patience and understanding with this.  Some of the problems are the word processor.  I'm using word 07.  A few quick comments: The ability to use land tiles is added in the next expansion to this.  In the initial release you can't do that.  I wanted there to be far less tiles in the starter expansion so I removed the island tiles with roads.  I'm almost ready with the expansion to the base set that will bring back the "growing island" rules.  On the reefs, I don't understand what is wrong.  Maybe I should just rewrite that part.  The background boxes are in their proper places as I see them.  Perhaps I will PDF this thing once it's done.  I'll definitely fix the island stuff.  On A&M being separate, it is separate from what I see.  Another word glitch?  Thanks again I'll try to get up a new version soon.

As for Reefs, I would just delete that sentence since you've already mentioned the same thing 2 sentences previously.

It may all be OK on your word processor.  Let's have a look at the PDF then - that would probably be the best thing to do at this stage since mostly everything is formatting.

The two reef sentences are different to me.  The first tells you what they look like.  The second shows you one of the ways a reef is closed.

Anyways, here is 0.81 in PDF:  http://www.mediafire.com/?2zxqlajomzz 

By "closed" do you mean completed?  If so the sentence might need to be reworded.

Edit: Oh, I finally understand what you're trying to say with that sentence.  "Reefs are completed when all the branches ends in large rocks, as shown in the example below."

Yes!  So is the term "closed" is only used on forums like "meeple"?  If I further revise I'll re-word that to say "completed".   Thanks

Yes, it's a non-formal term that the rules do not use.  The "formal" term is "completed", and you'll find that in the rules.  Hence I was confused about the term "closed" in your statement.

Ok so I'll give it a few days and if there are no more changes besides this one, I'll call it 1.0!  I'm sure there are some people waiting for that, and will find "bugs" after playing it.  But I think as it stands right now it's a fairly healthy expansion.  Work is well underway on the expansion too!

I think everything is covered.  After so many revisions, I'm glad this is finally done.

Also, when you start a new expansion, could I request that you start a new thread for it so that would make it easier to track?  Thanks.

I added a tiny bit of polish to the tiles and here is the full package download:

http://www.mediafire.com/?g2uoykwfoy1

Everything you need to get into the ocean is included there.  Thank you for helping me get it to this point.  And if you actually take the time and expense to create this, please let me know what you think!  I am happy to revise the rules in the future, if needed.  

Could you do me a favour A?  I would like to put a montage of tiles (sort of like the Treasure Hunt) on the Public downloads page and I was wondering if you could make me a gif/jpg?  Thanks.  Oh, added to Public Downloads and merit point for you :)

This is next on my build list, I've just finished the Lake. When I went to print the tiles off, I couldn't get them to be the right size, they were opening up as 1 5/8 inches. Is there any way to get the Ocean tiles as a PDF so that the size is fixed?

I do so covet these gorgeous tiles.... <O{

Try messing with the printer zoom or the fit to page options.  If that doesn't work I'll try to convert a few to see how they look.  Thanks for the interest, your in for a big project!

The pnp guild at BGG had some suggestions about printing these tiles, which I used to make a quick fix for my own use.

In short, I resized the file to 8.5x11 inches, resolution 150 dpi, and cropped about 1/2 inch off the top (just to the top of the C in Carcassonne) and then saved it all as a pdf. Worked a treat.

Here's the thread at BGG: http://www.boardgamegeek.com/article/4441766#4441766

Thanks so much to Skipboris for making these lovely tiles  :), we are about to be snowed in and I'm looking forward to a nice indoor project!

I made boats in Sculpy last week, I'd never worked with it before. They turned out OK, but very basic.

It is quite an undertaking to make all the tiles, but hopefully it's worth it!  Let me know how your first game goes.

Hey skip, I noticed that the Deltas file is titled #26.  If that's acurate, I'm missing 20-25.  Did I do something wrong?

Never mind, I see that Buried Treasure hasn't gone up yet.

You can get Buried Treasure from the forum thread link.  It's hosted on Mediafire.  But that only has tile sheets 20-24.  Sheet 25 is a new, much more weighty expansion that I'm not finished with yet.  Deltas was just a quick idea I had that gave me an excuse to make the catapult tiles as well.  What do you think, should I stop at 300 tiles?  :)