Catan 5–6 Player Rules FAQ

The 5–6 expansion lets up to 6 players play. You combine the base game tiles with the expansion tiles to build a 30-hex board (rows of 3-4-5-6-5-4-3) and use the expanded number-token set.

After the active player ends their turn, every other player gets a "build phase" where they may build (roads, settlements, cities) and play a single development card — but they cannot trade, and they don't collect resources unless someone's roll later activates their hexes. This keeps everyone engaged while waiting for their turn to come back around.

Lay out the 30 hexes in the 3-4-5-6-5-4-3 elongated arrangement. Surround with the longer sea frame from the expansion. Place number tokens on every non-desert hex (28 tokens total). Each player places two starting settlements and two roads in turn order, then in reverse turn order — exactly like the base game, but with 5 or 6 players.

You need 10 victory points — the same threshold as the base game. Some house rules raise it to 12 to compensate for the longer game, but the official 2025 rulebook keeps it at 10.

Typically 90–150 minutes. The build phase keeps things moving, but more players means more decisions per round.

The expansion adds 24 resource cards (4 of each non-desert resource) and 9 development cards on top of the base game's set, so the bank can support six players without running out mid-game.

No — the build phase is non-trading. Trades only happen during the active player's "trade and build" phase. Players in their build phase can only build with resources already in their hand and may play one development card.

Identical to the base game: when a 7 is rolled, every player with more than 7 cards discards half (rounded down), and the active player moves the robber and steals one card from a player on the new hex. The robber blocks production until moved again.

Each player has the same number of pieces as in the base game: 15 roads, 5 settlements, and 4 cities. The expansion box contains a fifth and sixth set in additional player colours.

The expansion adds 10 number tokens — one each of 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 — for 28 tokens total on the board (30 hexes minus 2 deserts).

Yes. The expansion adds one extra 6 and one extra 8, giving you three of each on the board. The default red-on-red adjacency rule still applies — and matters more, because the larger board has more potential adjacencies to manage.

Three core differences: (1) the build phase between turns, (2) a larger board (30 vs 19 hexes) with two deserts, and (3) more pieces in the bank to handle six players. Otherwise victory conditions, building costs, the robber, ports, trading, and development cards are identical.

Yes. CATAN GmbH publishes 5–6 player extensions for both Seafarers and Cities & Knights that bolt onto the base 5–6 expansion. You need the matching extension box for each themed expansion.

It's balanced when you use the default rules (red-number adjacency disabled, 2/12 adjacency disabled, identical-number adjacency disabled). With six players, settlement spots are tight; loosening rules tends to amplify the variance between strong and weak corners. Use this site's 5–6 board generator to produce a balanced map in seconds.

Two deserts spread the "no production" hexes across a larger board so no single area becomes too dense with red 6 and 8 tokens. The robber starts on the first desert; the second is just dead space.

Officially no — the build phase is part of the rules. Skipping it makes the game faster but punishes players whose resources sit idle. If your group wants speed, raise the victory threshold instead.

Yes. Longest road (≥5 segments) is worth 2 VP; largest army (≥3 played Knights) is worth 2 VP. Both bonuses move when another player strictly exceeds the current holder. The longer 5–6 player game means both bonuses change hands more often than in a base-game session, which makes defending them a more active strategic concern. Players who plan to compete for longest road in 5–6 mode should commit early — by the time five other players have placed roads, contiguous open coast for a five-segment chain becomes scarce.

The 5–6 player expansion uses 11 ports instead of the base game's 9: six generic 3:1 ports and five resource-specific 2:1 ports (one per resource type). Ports are placed at the corners of the stretched hex roughly every other coastal edge, per the diagram in the 2025 5–6 player rulebook. Because more players are competing for coastal settlements and resource-specific 2:1 ports are scarce relative to the larger map, port placement is more strategically valuable in 5–6 player games than in the 3–4 player version.

Once the development card deck is empty, no more development cards can be purchased — players continue with whatever cards remain in their hands. The 5–6 player expansion includes 9 additional development cards to reduce the chance of running out: 4 extra Knights, plus 1 each of Victory Point, Road Building, Year of Plenty, Monopoly, and a second extra Knight. Across a six-player game where everyone competes for largest army, exhausting the deck around turn 15–20 is uncommon but possible.

No. Only the active desert (where the robber starts) interacts with the robber. The second desert is a permanent dead hex — it produces no resources, the robber cannot be placed on it after the initial setup (the robber moves to a hex that produces something), and no settlements adjacent to it can be blocked by robber placement. Strategically, settling on the second desert's edges is a half-measure: the adjacent non-desert hexes still produce, but a corner that touches only the second desert and one resource hex is one of the weakest spots on the 5–6 board.