The players of the Catan Online World meet in the Tavern. Click on the game table at the center of the room to open the Game Manager. The Game Manager helps you find opponents for all the games offered in the Catan Online World. You can resize the Game Manager window using your mouse.

A small icon indicates the type of game. Next to the icon, the name of the game is displayed, followed by the selected game options (see below) in brackets and the names of the players underneath. As usual, you can use a variety of settings to filter the display.

On the one hand, there are game specific filters available for that purpose:

Game Specific

If you click on the top left button  (in the illustration: “All Games”), you can select a game group and a particular game. Only games belonging to the selection will be displayed.

In addition, there are two drop-down menus to combine various filters.

Setting A: Visibility

• Global
  All games are displayed when using this filter, no matter which city the game was set up in.
• City-Internal
  This is the counterpart to “Global.” Only games set up by players coming from the same city as oneself are displayed.

Setting B: Mode

• Standard - Normal gaming activity
• Official Tournament - Games set up during the official Tournament Days.
• Community Tournament - Tournaments organized by the community.

Depending on the respective options selected under the settings A and B, the corresponding chat channels are opened automatically. The default stting is Worldwide-Standard with the Global-SPV Chat Channel.

Example:

The citizens of the city can use the setting City-Internal - Community Tournament for tournaments they have organized. Games set up under this setting are not displayed among the "normal" games. For each city, a dedicated chat channel is available. For example, Port Niagara would have the channel Port Niagara Community Tournament.

Open

Displays games that have been set up but were not started yet. Those games have a light green bar color.

Running

Games that were already started. One can join these games as a spectator. However, only games the players didn’t select the option “Invisible” for are listed here; more about this later. Running games are represented by a yellow bar.

Interrupted

These games are symbolized by a dark green bar. Here, a player is needed for the game to be continued. If the other players agree, you can join the game and continue it.

Time-out

Players who lose connection to the server, thus causing an interruption of the game, have a 2-minute time-out so they can return to the game. During this time-out, no other player can enter the game (in the Game Manager, the game is displayed in gray), and it cannot be aborted either. The time-out does not apply if a player leaves the game on his/her own initiative.

Important: If a player leaves a game at his own request (e.g., via the "Leave game" menu), the time-out is not activated and the remaining players can immediately invite a substitute player.

Game Setup

To set up a new game, click on "Open." However, before the game is displayed in the Game Manager, you have the possibility to specify diverse options, if available for the selected game. Options can be changed even after setting up the game, as long as the game hasn’t been started yet. No changes are possible afterwards. The following options are available (does not apply for Catan – The Card Game):

drawseat

The seating plan is randomly determined.  Otherwise, the order in which the players entered the game applies.

host

Only the player who sets up the game can change the options.

start

With this option, the starting player can be determined. Otherwise, the starting player is determined randomly.

invisible

When this option is active, the players are not listed in the Game Manager after the game has started. That way, spectators cannot join in at a later moment. This option thus allows the players to stay amongst themselves.

players

With this option, you can set a fixed number of players. The game can be started only when a sufficient number of players have joined. Also, players in excess of the fixed number cannot join the game. This option is switched off in the default settings.

immediateRobber

This option is important for Cities & Knights and is related to an old variation of the rule. Normally, and when this option is deactivated, the Robber is moved only after the first barbarian attack; that’s the official rule. With this option, however, the Robber is immediately active.

friendlyRobber

For the Basic Game and the scenarios without Cities & Knights, there is another game option called “FriendlyRobber” that derives from the expansion “Traders & Barbarians.” According to this rule, the robber may only be placed on terrains adjacent to which there is no settlement that belongs to a player with less than 3 victory points. Consequently, the robber cannot be used to steal a resource from a player who has less than 3 victory points.

noscoring

The game is not given a score (neither in the chart nor for resource distribution). This option can be used to play games for learning or testing purposes; these games can be abandoned without any consequences.

cardStack

Original: Instead of the two dice, a virtual stack of 36 cards is used to determine the resource number. The distribution is: 2=1;3=2;4=3;5=4;6=5;7=6;8=5;9=4;10=3;11=2;12=1.

To avoid predictability of the distribution, 5 cards are randomly removed. If the stack is depleted, all cards are shuffled and 5 cards are removed again. This procedure corresponds to the rule included in the expansion "Traders & Barbarians" (but without the events). This new option is available for all Catan scenarios except Elasund. In MultiCatan, the card stack is always used and the option “cardStack” is not available.

Please note: Because of the fact that 5 cards are randomly removed, even with this option a perfect distribution of numbers should not be expected; the variance, however, is lower in comparison with the two dice.

Revised: In this variant of the original cardStack option, 18 cards are randomly removed from two card decks with 36 cards; the remaining cards are put together. That way, the variance of the distribution is higher than in the original stack, while at the same time predictability is impossible.

DesertBorder (only "Realm of the Desert Sons")

If a card is placed adjacent to the border of the game area, the side of the card depicting desert must be facing the border. This rule change has the effect that the "cleaning up strategy" – where a player moves his caravan along the border to single-handedly scoop up commodities and camels – loses much of its attractiveness.

After setting the options, the game appears in the Game Manager, and other players can join in. After all game positions are occupied, all players must confirm the start of the game by clicking on the Start button, and the game can begin.

Resumption

Should one of the players be forced to momentarily leave the game due to a network problem, the game pauses and the player can reenter. If one of the players drops out for other reasons, for instance because he/she has an important appointment and the game lasted longer than expected, then a different player can join in. In this case, the remaining players can look for substitutes via the Global-SPV Channel.

A game where no players are present can only be accessed by the players who are listed in this game's record in the Game Manager. As soon as at least one player is present, other players may join in as well (if the player who is present agrees).

Important:

The substitute player receives the score for the game only if he/she wins. If the substitute player loses, the original player receives the score. Therefore, you should never prematurely abandon a game, because in this case you no longer have influence on the outcome and still get the bad score if the substitute loses.

Please note: Out of consideration for other players, one should, as a matter of principle, always try to finish a game, even if sometimes things are not going so well and there is little chance to win. In that case, it is a matter of decency to finish the game no matter what. It is important to have fun playing the games, and you shouldn't deprive your opponents of that fun by dropping out.

Watching

A game that has been declared as “open” by its participants (the option “Invisible” is switched off) can be displayed via the filter “Running Games” after it has started. Any other avatar can now join this game via the “Watch” function as a spectator. Inside the game, he/she appears in the Avatar bar and is looking “over the shoulder” of one of the players. Of course, he/she cannot look into that player’s cards. He/she just sees the information that is visible to the other players.

Special Features for Catan – The Card Game

The Card Game is an independent program, for which the Catan Online World client only provides the game connection and administrates the results. For technical reasons, the functions of the Catan Online World are thus not available for the Card Game.

1. Watching is not possible.
2. There are no special options.
3. Avatars are not displayed in the Card Game.
4. Only the original players can resume the game. No substitutes can be inserted. For that purpose, both players have to set up a new game of the same type and join it. Then they are asked if they want to continue the old game, in case there is a valid saved game. A saved game is established in each round, after rolling the dice. Actions posterior to the dice roll are forfeited if the game is interrupted.

Please also note the technical information for Catan – The Card Game.