Crop Circles (1st edition)
General info and comments
Crop Circles I originally released by Hans im Glück in 2010
Crop Circles II (Mini #7) originally released by Hans im Glück in 2012
The Crop Circles I expansion was an independently packaged expansion which was also included in some versions of the German base game of Carcassonne. The Crop Circles II “expansion” is considered #7 of the mini-expansions released in 2012, but it does not exist as an independent set. Rather, one tile was packed with each of the preceding 6 miniexpansions. The rules for Crop Circles I and Crop Circles II are functionally identical. (The version of the rules specific to Crop Circles II can be found on the HiG website, as it is not packaged with the tiles themselves.)
Contents
- Crop Circles I: 6 new land tiles
- Crop Circles II: 6 new land tiles
Rules
Preparation
The six crop circle tiles should be mixed with the rest of the tiles.
Playing the Game
A player who draws a tile with a crop circle places it according to the usual rules and carries out a normal turn. After that, he or she decides whether all players, starting with the player to his or her left: A) may[1] take one of their own followers from their supply and deploy it next to another of their followers already on a landscape tile, or B) must remove one of their own followers from a landscape tile and return it to their supply.
It is important to observe that
- The active player must choose action A) or B).
- The type of follower affected is decided by the tile drawn, as follows:
File:Crop fork.png ‘Pitchfork’ crop circle This affects farmers (on a farm segment). |
File:Crop club.png ‘Club’ crop circle This affects thieves (on a road segment). |
File:Crop shield.png ‘Shield’ crop circle This affects knights (on a city segment). |
When a player performs action A), he or she must deploy the follower to a feature which already contains a follower of the same type (farmer to a farmer, thief to a thief, knight to a knight).[2]
- If a player is unable to perform the action, due to not having a follower of the
required type in play, then he or she will be passed over and the player to the left should continue.
- The active player performs the action last, and then next player should take their
turn as usual.
Example of option A)
- RED places a tile with a ‘shield’ crop circle and deploys a follower to it. RED chooses option A). Every player may deploy a knight (because of the ‘Shield’ symbol) next to a knight already in play.
- GREEN deploys a second knight next to the one already in play.
- BLUE does not have a knight and so cannot deploy one.
- RED deploys a second knight next to the one just deployed to the tile which was placed. She may not deploy a follower to the other city segment on the same tile because there is no knight on it. She could also have deployed her follower beside the knight on the top left tile.
Example of option B)
- GREEN places a tile with a ‘pitchfork’ crop circle and deploys a follower to it. The city is scored: GREEN received 6 points and removes his follower. Then he chooses option B). Every player must remove a farmer (because of the ‘pitchfork’ symbol).
- BLUE removes his farmer.
- RED removes her farmer.
- GREEN does not have a farmer, and so cannot remove one.
Tile distribution
Crop Circles I
Crop Circles II
Footnotes
- ↑ Note that the rules for option A) clearly state that players may decide whether to deploy a second follower next to one already in play. In other words, the active player decides what effect the crop circle has: A) deployment or B) removal. If removal, all players must remove one follower of the appropriate type. If deployment, the players may choose to deploy or not to deploy a second follower. If option A) is chosen but a player has no followers in the supply, he or she is forced to “choose” not to deploy a second follower.
- ↑ Any follower in a city, including a Mayor or a Wagon, is considered to be a knight.