Carcassonne Dice Game

[Scott]

You know, just the other night when I couldn't sleep : I thought about whether it would be possible to create a "dice only" Carcassonne, sort of like the Catan dice game (which I recently purchased...). I contemplated several options, like having 5 or six identical dice where the sides would similar to what you described above, or maybe just three dice which all have a different setup. The trouble was that I couldn't figure out how to turn all that into calculable points. Maybe I should give it some more thought when I'm less sleepy. 

I'll take a piece of that action.

I took a quick look at the Catan dice game, and the following pictures pretty much sum it up:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/194583
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/196881

I think for a Carcassonne dice game all the dice cannot be the same. Here's my ideas for a Carcassonne d6 dice game:

1d6 landscape feature die - we've got farm, road, city, and cloister; repeat road and city?
2d6 point-scoring dice - numbered faces 1 thru 6
1d6 bonus points die - two faces feature "+1"; one face depicts a builder; other faces are blank
1d6 trade goods die - wine, grain, and cloth depicted on opposing faces

I think most can figure out how to play.

[hester]

Sounds interesting, but to be honest I can't quite figure out how you envision the scoring. Multiply the numbers from the scoring dice with the usual points from the landscape feature? And what's the bonus die for?

After giving my initial idea some further thought, I'm aiming at something like "Yahtzee Carcassonne" now (part of the idea also came from seeing the "CarcaCube" on BGG). You get nine landscape dice (with tile images) and one meeple die, and a scorecard with several fixed features that need to be completed. I even made some prototype dice last night, but after rolling them several times I found some problems with the tile distribution and my first batch of rules, so I need to go over all that again.

I'll try and post a picture of the prototype later, but in the meantime any and all comments would be appreciated. Even if you think the idea should go straight to the trash.

[Scott]

The two numbered dice indicate the number of points scored for the landscape feature depicted on the landscape die. The "+1" faces on the bonus die might be more clear if they were "x2" to indicate that the score should be doubled. The "builder" face yields an extra turn. The trade goods die awards a trade good if the landscape die depicts a city.

[hester]

Ah, now I get it. Yes, that would work. However, it would be a game of pure luck then, where you have little to no means of actually "using" the dice in different ways to yield different results; you'd just add up points.

Here's a picture of my "Yahtzee-style Carcassonne" prototype.


The idea is to arrange them in a 3x3 grid. There will also be a meeple die that will give you 1, 2 or 3 meeples to use on the grid. A builder will allow you to roll one or more dice a second time. The scorecard will have pre-defined features like "city of 4 segments", "road of five segments", "completed cloister" etc. which you need to fill in with the appropriate points.

I need to get bigger dice without rounded corners though. The standard size is too small and the stickers come off at the corners. I also need to change the tile layouts because there are too many road corners in the prototype and not enough straight roads.

[Scott]

I think there's definitely room in the world for more than one Carc dice game. I am slightly concerned at how long it will take for each player to take their turn, considering how long some people spend with a single tile.

If you have wood-working skills (or can bribe somebody that does), you could make your own wooden cubes out of scrap wood. Failing that, your local craft store probably has something.

[hester]

There definitely is room! As for the time factor, I thought of employing a time limit, maybe two minutes.

I just ordered some cubes which should work a little better.

[Whaleyland]

Let me just say that I really like this Carc Dice Game idea with the pictures on all the sides to create a mini-plot with an extra cube for Meeple numbers. Very interesting. I will definitely try this out if you make it. Perhaps, when you make the print outs, make ones for regular sized dice and ones for larger dice, so that we can try it out first (or make it more portable). I really like the idea, though, so keep working on it!

[hester]

@ Whaleyland, thanks for the encouragement!

I spent yesterday night trying to work out the dice layouts. I want all the individual dice to match all around, so it's a real challenge. At first I planned on using only tiles from the basic game, but that was too boring. Finally I decided to use all tiles that were officially released by HiG and RGG which show only the features that were already part of the basic game (city, farm, road, cloister, pennant; no trade goods, dragon symbols, tower foundations etc.). I'm also not using any tile more times than it exits (e.g. there's only one CRFF in the whole set).

I like puzzles, so I'll get there eventually.

[Scott]

Moving this to the archives since HiG came out with their own dice game since this thread was created.