Brick and Wood Win Early, Ore and Wheat Win Late

On your fourth turn, you would trade almost anything for one brick. By your twentieth, you might be holding three bricks that nobody at the table wants. Same card, different game.

That shift is one of the most useful patterns in Catan. Once you see it, you can plan your settlements, your trades, and even your setup around it.

Why does a card’s value change during a game?

A resource is only worth what you can build with it. And what you need to build changes as the game goes on.

Here are the four costs again, broken out by resource.

Two things jump out. Wheat is the only resource in three costs, so you need it all game. And brick and wood only go into roads and settlements, so their value rises and falls with how much room is left to grow.

What do you need early in the game?

Early on, the board is wide open. Good spots sit empty, and the fastest way to get ahead is to claim them. Every new settlement adds a point and a new source of cards, so growth now pays you back for the rest of the game.

Growth costs brick and wood. Reaching a new spot usually takes one or two roads, then the settlement itself. That is two or three bricks and two or three woods for one new settlement.

And everyone is chasing the same thing at the same time. That is why brick feels like gold on turn 4. Demand is high, and as you will see below, supply is often low.

What changes in the middle of the game?

Somewhere in the middle, the board fills up. Open spots disappear, and the ones left take longer roads to reach. Most players start upgrading to cities and building development cards.

Now wheat is in demand from every direction. You need it for your last settlements, for cities, and for development cards. Ore climbs too, and wool gets a second job in development cards.

Brick and wood do not go to zero. You may still want one more settlement, or a few roads for Longest Route. But they stop being the cards everyone begs for.

Why do ore and wheat win late?

Late in the game, cities do the heavy lifting.

• A city needs no new space. It upgrades a settlement you already own, so a full board cannot stop you.
• A city doubles that corner’s income. More cards, every time its numbers roll.
• A city adds a point. Settlement to city takes you from 1 point to 2.

Building all four of your cities takes 8 wheat and 12 ore. Add a few development cards for Largest Army or hidden Victory Points, and you can see why the late game runs on ore and wheat.

Here is the whole shift on one page.

Why are brick and ore the scarcest?

Count the hexes. Every standard board has:

Brick and ore come from three hexes each. Wood, wool, and wheat come from four. Fewer hexes usually means fewer pips, and fewer pips means fewer cards for the whole table.

Notice the timing. Brick is scarce at the very moment everyone wants it most, early. Ore is scarce when everyone wants it most, late. That makes these two the cards that swing games.

“Usually” matters, though. On any given board, the numbers can flip the picture. If all three hills sit on a 6, a 9, and a 10, there is plenty of brick to go around. If the hills sit on a 2, a 3, and an 11, brick will be painfully short. So at the start of each game, total the pips on each resource, the way you learned in Lesson 6. The resource with the fewest pips is this board’s real gold.

Where does wool fit?

Wool is the odd one out. It appears in only two costs, one card each. Many players end up with more wool than they can use, so it is often the cheapest card to get in a trade and the first one players turn in to the bank.

That does not make wool useless. You need it for every settlement and every development card. Just do not pay top price for a spot that is mostly wool.

How do you plan for the shift?

You do not need to predict every turn. A few habits cover most of it.

• Open with both phases in mind. Get some brick and wood for the early race, and a path to ore and wheat for later. That is why the Lesson 7 checklist asks for resource variety and early brick and wood.
• Point each new settlement at what you will need next. Your third or fourth settlement is a great time to add the ore or wheat your opening lacked.
• Buy what is cheap now, before it gets expensive. Early in the game, few people want ore, so it is easy to get in trades. Late, the reverse is true for brick.
• Sell what is hot. If you hold brick on turn 4, you have the table’s attention. Ask for a good rate.
• Watch what others need. A player asking for ore every turn is building cities. Now you know their plan, and what they will pay.

Try it this week

Your drill is to note which resource you needed most at turns 5, 15, and 25.

1. Keep a scrap of paper by your seat. Make a tally mark each time your turn starts, so you know which turn you are on.
2. Stop at turns 5, 15, and 25. At each one, write down the resource you wanted most right then, and whether you had it.
3. Write down your extra, too. Next to it, note the resource you had too much of.
4. Read the list after the game. Did your need move from brick and wood toward ore and wheat? If the game ended before turn 25, that is useful too. Note what you were missing at the end.
5. Count the board next time. At your next setup, total the pips for each resource and mark the scarcest one. Watch whether that card ends up being the one everyone fights over.