Search
Review of Star Trek Catan: Federation Space Map Set
Blurb from the publisher: 'Boldly go and explore the galaxy in this expansion for Star Trek Catan!
During its original mission, the U.S.S. Enterprise, Captain Kirk, and his intrepid crew visited many strange new worlds, and discovered many new life-forms and civilizations. Now you and your friends can Boldly Go and Explore this Galaxy too! Follow in Kirk's 'warp trail' with this 2-map expansion set.
Based entirely on the 'Explored Galaxy' map seen in Kirk's own quarters, these maps allow you to settle the famous worlds of Federation Space using pieces from your Star Trek Catan base game.'
What you get: Your USD 30,00 or equivalent will buy you Star Trek Catan: Federation Space Map Set, an expansion for Star Trek Catan. For those who somehow missed that, it is an autonomous game based on the Catan gaming engine and set in the Star Trek universe. The base game can accommodate 3 to 4 players in just over an hour. Adding this expansion is likely to increase game time to 75 or even 90 minutes. It is interesting to note that while the base game is sold in its second edition under the imprint of Catan Studio, the present expansion still bears the markings and contact details of Mayfair Games, a company that went extinct at the beginning 2018 already. I take it for granted that the present expansion will also get refreshed sooner than later.
In addition to the 24-page English Almanac (the rules take two pages only) that can be found on the publisher's website free of charge, the game also contains the following: 2 one-sided, mounted, full color Maps depicting the Explored Galaxy known as Federation Space, 4 Individual Scoring tracks, 8 Scoring markers (2 per player), and 18 Victory Point tokens.
In the interest of full disclosure, and even though this is an expansion for a new iteration of Catan, I have been playing Catan (then called Settlers of Catan) since 1999, along with all its expansions. I have also participated in competitive events years back, achieving top-3 placements at my best. This is not your average playtest.
Gameplay: The biggest allure of the Federation Space Map set are the two maps. These are (partially) modelled after the maps in Kirk's own quarters as shown in TOS back in the 1960s already. In contrast to the 19-tile hexagon map of standard Catan, one map is 40 (!) tiles big while the other is 29 tiles big. Both maps break the rules about placing settle- sorry, Outposts. On these maps Outposts can only be placed where the map allows you to place them. At times this can be four spaces away, while in others it can be right next to one another. Even more so, these Outpost locations also work as bottlenecks and traffic signs. One has to build an outpost there, if he wishes to progress further on with a Starship. By definition, this makes taking certain routes easier than it is to take others.
Other intersections are marked by VP signs. Whenever one builds a Starship touching upon such an intersection, he takes a VP for himself. As expected, this type of VPs work in the same way as any other type, and bring the end of the game closer. For this reason, the game suggests an additional variant whereupon it ends at 13 VPs for three players and 12 VPs for four.
The scoring tracks can be used to track the VPs of each player. Unless I am mistaken, this is the only Catan game currently in print to actively do something of the kind.
The remaining pages of the Almanac (i.e. 90% of the booklet) contain a summary of all the episodes of Star Trek TOS, and how each relates to a particular planet from the ones seen on these maps.
The strong points: The production values are the first thing one observes in this expansion. The maps are indeed gorgeous, as practical as they are aesthetically pleasing. The depiction of the planets and numerals follows the German paradigm of Catan: the bigger the number, the more likely it is to statistically appear. Its chances of appearance are still presented under it in the form of dots. That's quite useful for those still learning the game. The fact that each planet also ranges in size in direct relation to its chance of producing resources is a nice touch.
The maps are interesting, to say the least, and I am not talking only as a Star Trek fan. Sure, they will remind one of certain TOS episodes ('wasn't it here that Kirk was relieved of his shirt... again?'), and in that sense they offer quite the involvement to fans of the show. What is important for gamers however is that they are challenging and exciting. Scenarios in Seafarers usually add other parameters, like additional conditions or rules-tweaking. Here the only tweaks are the locations and the function of the Outposts, as well as the importance of the scattered VPs. Not taking those into account, and how your empire will progress from its starting point, is likely to cost you game after game.
In fact, having fixed positions for building Outposts is an interesting take on the game (and one I do not recall having seen elsewhere); idem for those functioning as road blocks, and forcing you to plant Outposts before progressing. It makes thematic sense, I guess; building the Federation is a methodical endeavour that requires a solid basis, not a blitzkrieg where one grabs land and fills in the gaps later.
Scoring tracks, yey! Why can't every Catan game include them? It's far easier to obsess people with gaming when they can better visualize what is going on and how is winning, something that is not always evident when an amateur looks at a Catan (or a Star Trek Catan) board.
The weak points: Federation Space is a problematic supplement not because of what it contains, but because of what it doesn't. Up to now Catan one-offs see a maximum of one expansion. If this is the one-off for Star Trek Catan, this means that the game will never be played with five or six players. Talk about style over substance.
As much as one likes Star Trek, the maps will feel rigid and repetitive after a few plays. Why not produce the missing tiles in order to combine them with those of the base game, and create the exact same maps through guidelines and scenarios? This is the approach of the main Catan game line, i.e. the one taken in Seafarers and elsewhere. The fixed map idea is a patently inferior one, unless one plans to heavily support the line with maps upon maps. This is not the case here.
Even more so, who had the bright idea of two single-sided maps instead of a double sided one? This could have helped lessen the impact of a product that is ludicrously expensive for what it contains and ultimately achieves. Alternatively, it could have meant four different maps (two double sided maps), with the designers also tackling other quadrants after TOS. This is the definition of a missed opportunity.
The scoring tracks are cool, yet they are numbered once in 'human' (see: standard Arabic numerals) and thrice in 'alien' numbering systems. Wait a second though. In Star Trek Catan everybody controls a (disappointingly anonymous) aspect of the Federation. Why on earth do we now get Klingon, Vulcan, and Romulan scoring tracks, when we are all fielding little Enterprises and call upon Starfleet to save us from the Klingons? Even for a game with zero entanglement between rules and theme like Star Trek Catan, this is just too much. Are the designers really trying to make the theme feel as haphazardly plastered upon the rules as possible, à la Star Trek Monopoly?
No, it actually does get worse. The booklet is addressed exclusively to Trekkies, not to gamers who happen to be Trekkies. The twenty pages devoted to the episodes of TOS contain zero gaming information. Now think of what the game would have been like if it contained tiles instead of rigid maps, and the 22 remaining pages of the rulebook included different Star Trek Catan scenarios, zooming in or out in different areas of the explored galaxy. That could have meant added variants, new rules, and options which could have helped reenact even episode plots within a Catan scenario. The fact that I can think of such an expansion but the designers (or publishers) didn't, or if they did, shot it down, is extremely disheartening.
Just in case you didn't read the Star Trek Catan review, the items in this product will actually fit the base product... but only if you throw that products plastic tray away. This isn't a problem of the present product, yet still.
After all this, I am actually nitpicking when I state that the base Star Trek Catan game contains little zip-lock bags while the expansion doesn't. It it the least of anybody's worries.
Conclusion: As a Catan and Trek fan, I really wanted to like the Star Trek Catan: Federation Space Map Set. It is however an outright mediocre expansion, and one that needs a serious conceptual overhaul should Catan Studio decide to place its logo on it after Mayfair's print run runs out. It set the wrong goals (to provide hard card board maps as opposed to additional tiles that can emulate a myriad maps in all four quadrants), omitted other goals (no fifth and sixth player), and trampled even on the theme of the base game (scoring tracks relating to Star Trek aliens when nobody plays one). Thus, the expansion willingly set a very low bar to pass... and barely passed it. Fascinating, as Spock would have said.
For more info on Star Trek Catan: Federation Space Map Set visit Catan Studio at https://www.catanstudio.com
Shameless plug: for more gaming news and content (including, for example, pictures of Star Trek Catan: Federation Space Map Set that I am unfortunately not able to upload on RPG.net for the time being), and to better keep track of my reviews, subscribe to my Antonios S facebook and twitter page.
