New World Base Game

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General info and comments

Originally released by Hans im Glück in 2008 as Mayflower, when it was published by Rio Grande Games, in English, the name was changed to New World.

The game uses many of the standard Carcassonne game concepts, but moves it from medieval France, to the early settlement of the North American east coast.

The players develop the New World starting from a representation of the east coast between Jamestown in the south, stretching up to Plymouth in the north. Leaving the coast behind, exploring ever further westward, players deploy their settlers on the trails, in the towns, in the farms, and on the plains. The skills of the players to develop the area and use their robbers, shopkeepers, trappers, and farmers will determine who is victorious.

The players place land tiles turn by turn. As they do so, the trails, towns, plains, and farms emerge and grow. On their turns, the players can deploy their settlers on these features to earn points. Players score points during the game and at the end. The player with the most points after the final scoring is the winner.

The game introduces the concept of surveyors who typically lead the drive westwards. If your settlers fail to move westwards on the coat-tails of the surveyors they may lose the chance to score points.

Contents

• 95 Land tiles
• 30 settlers in 5 different colours (6 each, but one used as scoreboard marker)

• 2 surveyors in white

• Game Board combining Scoring Track and Start Spaces

Preparation

Place the game board on one side of the table so that the starting spaces face toward the middle of the table. Shuffle the land tiles face down and stack them in several face-down stacks so that all players have easy access to them.

Each player takes the 6 settlers in his/her colour and places one as his/her scoring marker in the large "0" space at the lower corner of the scoring track. Each player places their remaining 5 settlers in front of them on the table (the play area) as their supply.

Place the two surveyors on the starting spaces at opposite ends on the game board.

The youngest player decides who starts the game.

Playing The Game

Players take turns in clockwise order, beginning with the starting player. On a player's turn, he/she executes the following actions in the following order:

• The player must draw and place a new land tile
• The player may deploy one of his/her settlers from his/her supply to the land tile just placed
• If, by placing the land tile, farms, trails, and/or towns are completed, they are now scored
• The player's turn is over and the next player, in clockwise order, takes his/her turn in the same manner

These actions are described, in more detail, in the sections below.

Placing a tile

First a player must draw a land tile from one of the face-down stacks. After looking at it, it should be shown to the other players (so they can advise on the "best" placement of the tile), and then placed on the table, using the following rules:

• The new tile (shown with red borders in the examples) must be placed with at least one edge next to one previously placed tile or next to one of the starting spaces on the game board. The new tile may not be placed corner to corner with a previous tile or starting space.
• The new tile must be placed so that all plains, town, and trail segments on the new tile continue plains, town, and trail segments on all touching tiles.

Trail and plains segments are continued

Town segment is continued

On one edge the town segment is continued and on the other edge the plains segment is continued

This is an invalid placement

In the rare circumstance where a drawn tile has no legal placement (and all players agree), the player discards the tile from the game (into the box) and draws another tile to place.

Placing a settler

After the player places a land tile, he/she may deploy one of their settlers, using the following rules:

• The player may only play 1 settler on a turn
• The player must take it from his supply
• The player may only deploy it to the tile just placed
• The player must choose where to deploy the settler on the tile, either as a:

Shopkeeper in a town segment

Robber on a trail segment

Trapper on a plains segment - either location shown is valid - lay trappers on their sides

Farmer in a farm

• The player may not deploy a settler on a plains, town, or trail segment if that segment connects to a segment of the same feature on another tile (no matter how far away) that already has a settler (from any player, including the active player) on it. See the following examples.

BLUE can only deploy a trapper as there is already a shopkeeper in a connected town segment.

BLUE can deploy his settler as a shopkeeper or a robber, but only as a trapper in the small plains segment where the red arrow points. In the larger plains segment there is already a RED trapper on a connected plains segment.

When a player has deployed all of their settlers, they continue to play land tiles each turn. Although a settler may not be recalled, settlers are returned to players when farms, trails, and towns are scored.

The player’s turn is over and the next player in clockwise order takes their turn, and so on.

Remember: if, through the placement of the tile, towns, trails, and/or farms are completed, these are scored before moving on to the next player.

Scoring a feature

A Completed Trail

Trading Post

A trail is complete when the trail segments on both ends connect to a crossing, a town segment, or a farm, or when the trail forms a complete loop. The trail may have many segments between its ends.

The player who has a robber on a completed trail scores one point for each tile in the completed trail (count the number of tiles; separate segments on a tile count just once) and 2 points for each trading post along the trail.

The player moves their scoring marker forward on the scoring track a number of spaces equal to the points earned. If you pass 50 on the scoring track, lay your scoring marker down to indicate a score greater than 50 and continue along the track.

RED earns 3 points

RED earns 8 points - 4 for the trail and 4 extra for the 2 trading posts

A Completed Town

Town Flag

A town is complete when the town is completely surrounded by a town wall and there are no gaps in the wall. A town may have many segments.

The player who has a shopkeeper in a completed town scores two points for each tile in the town (count the tiles, not the segments). Each flag on segments in the town earns the player 2 points.

RED earns 8 points - 3 town tiles and 1 flag.

RED earns 8 points - 4 town tiles, and no flags.

When a tile has 2 segments in a town, it still counts for just 2 points (1 tile).

What if a completed town or trail has more than one settler? It is possible through clever placement of land tiles for there to be more than one robber on a trail or more than one shopkeeper in a town. In a completed trail or town, the player with the most robbers (on a trail) or the most shopkeepers (in a town) earns all the points.

When two or more players tie with the most robbers or shopkeepers, they each earn the total points for the trail or town.

A Completed Farm

Farmhouse

A farm is complete when the tile it is on is completely surrounded by land tiles. The player with a farmer in the farm earns 9 points (1 for the farm tile and 1 each for the other tiles).

RED earns 9 points.

After Scoring

After a trail, a town, or a farm is scored (and only then), the settlers involved are returned to the appropriate players' supplies. The returned settlers may be used by the players as any of the possible settlers (robber, farmer, shopkeeper, or trapper) in later turns.

It is possible for a player to deploy a settler, score a trail, town, or farm, and have the settler returned on the same turn (always in this order):

1. Complete a town, trail, or farm with the new tile
2. Deploy a shopkeeper, robber, or farmer
3. Score the completed town, trail, or farm
4. Return the shopkeeper, robber, or farmer to player's supply

RED earns 4 points.

RED earns 3 points.

Surveyors: Their Bonuses and the limits they impose

After each feature is scored (there may be more than one in a turn), the player whose turn it is moves one surveyor one column to the west (away from the coast). It doesn't matter which tile the player places the surveyor on as long as it is in the correct column. The player must move the eastern-most surveyor if the surveyors are not in the same column. Thus, the two surveyors will never be more than one column apart in their westward trek. If the surveyors are both in the western-most column of tiles (no tiles to their west) neither moves. They will remain there until a feature is scored and there are tile(s) to their west. If a feature is completed, but not scored, the player does not move a surveyor. If there is only one tile in the westernmost column, both surveyors may share that space.

Scoring Bonus

When a settler is scored that is standing on the same column with one (or two) surveyor(s), the player scoring the settler gets +4 points for each surveyor! (note: a surveyor is moved after the settler is scored!)

Removing fallen-behind settlers

When a surveyor is moved west remove any standing settlers (not trappers - they remain lying down until the end of the game) from any columns to the "east" of the eastern-most surveyor and return them to their owners without scoring. A player may place a settler on a just-placed tile in columns "east" of the surveyors, but it is dangerous as such a settler (not a trapper) will be removed immediately after the next scoring!

In the first few turns the players played the settlers as shown in the graphic and scored the 2-tile trail on the north, removing the settler there and moving the top-most surveyor. Now, YELLOW (1) places the red-bordered tile and (2) her settler on the trail leading south. She scores her completed trail for 10 points (4 tiles + 1 trading post + 1 surveyor), (3) removes her settler from that trail and (4) moves the bottom-most surveyor westward one tile.

Next, BLUE (1) plays the red-bordered tile and (2) his settler on the small town, completing three features: * RED's city to the north * BLUE's farm, and * BLUE's small town BLUE scores his farm for 17 points (9 + 2 surveyors), (3) removes his settler from the farm, and (4) moves the top-most surveyor. Then, he scores his small town for 8 points (4 + 1 surveyor), (5) removes his settler from the town, and (6) moves the bottom-most surveyor, (7) forcing the GREEN and RED settlers out of the surveyor-vacated column. Thus, the "Red" town is not scored, as the RED settler is no longer there!

The Plains

Connected plains segments are called plains. Plains are not scored if completed during the game. Players may deploy trappers on plains segments, but they only score at the end of the game. A trapper remains in the plains segment where it is deployed for the entire game and is never returned to the player's supply! To emphasize this, place the trapper on its side on the plains segment. Plains are bordered by trails, towns, and the edge of the area where the land tiles are played.

Game End

At the end of the player's turn during which the last land tile is placed, the game ends. If the player completes one or more features, these are scored as normal and then the game proceeds to the final scoring.

Final Scoring : Incomplete Trails, Towns and Farms

For each incomplete trail and town, the player, who has a robber on the trail or shopkeeper in the town, earns one point for each trail or town segment (instead of 2 points). Flags (in towns) are worth 1 point each (instead of 2 points), but Trading Posts (on trails) are still worth 2 points.

For incomplete trails and towns with more than one settler, use the rules for completed trails and towns to determine who scores.

For an incomplete farm, the player with the farmer on the farm earns 1 point for the farm and 1 point for each land tile surrounding it.

RED earns 3 points for the incomplete trail.
YELLOW earns 5 points for the incomplete farm.
BLUE earns 3 points for the incomplete town on the lower right.
GREEN earns 8 points for the larger incomplete town on the left.
BLACK earns nothing, as GREEN has more shopkeepers in the town than BLACK.

Final Scoring : Trappers (for the animals in the plains)

The three animal symbols

Tip: To make plains scoring easier, remove settlers as you score the unfinished trails, towns, and farms.

In each plains area at the end of the game, the player with the most trappers in the area scores 1 point for each animal shown on plains segments in the area - there is no difference between the animal types. As with trails and towns, if several players tie with the most trappers in the area, each scores 1 point for each animal shown on the plains segments in the area.

When all completed plains areas are scored in this way, the scoring and the game is over.

RED earns 3 points. BLUE earns 2 points.

RED earns 4 points for the animals in the lower plains area, as he has 2 trappers in the area to YELLOW's 1. BLUE earns 2 points for the animals in the upper plains area.

In this example, RED and YELLOW each earn 4 points for the animals in the lower plains area, as each has 2 trappers in the area. BLUE earns 5 points for for his trapper in the upper plains area.

The player with the most points is the winner. If players tie with the most, they rejoice in their shared victory.

Tile distribution

Tile Count: 95

 ×2

 ×3

 ×3

 ×2

 ×1

 ×1

 ×1

 ×3

 ×2

 ×1

 ×4

 ×3

 ×1

 ×3

 ×2

 ×3

 ×4

 ×4

 ×1

 ×1

 ×3

 ×1

 ×1

 ×1

 ×1

 ×3

 ×2

 ×1

 ×2

 ×2

 ×1

 ×1

 ×2

 ×3

 ×1

 ×3

 ×3

 ×1

 ×3

 ×2

 ×1

 ×1

 ×1

 ×1

 ×1

 ×3

 ×1

 ×2

 ×1

 ×1

Back of Tiles:

 

 

House Rules

Place one surveyor on the start board, and the other on the 0 space of the scoring track. When the first trail, town or farm is completed, move the surveyor from the 0 space to the 1 space on the scoring track. Repeat from 1 to 2, 2 to 3, until he reaches space number 5, at which point he is placed on the game board, in any of the starting spaces (as described under preparation, above). Thereafter, the surveyors move, as described, when features are scored. (from BGG)

Credits

This page is primarily based on the New World rules published by Rio Grande Games with minor revisions to both rules and images adapted from the original Hans im Glück Mayflower rules where there has been some variation between sources. Additional comments and clarifications have come from various Carcassonne discussion forums (BGG, CarcC and CarcF).

Footnotes

For Icons explanation and licensing please visit Icons page.