Well it is now 2020 and my collection has grown significantly in the past few years.
So much so that I admit that even this website is out of date and I need to take some time to sit and photograph all the missing items that are on my shelves but not in my database.
However it is a good time to sit and think about what the purpose of my collection is and what am I wanting to achieve. When I started the broad goal was to just collect as many Catan items as possible. However now my goals have become more focussed. My core three goals now are:- To have a complete as possible collection of English language products covering the Catan's first 25 years (1995 - 2020).
- To have a wide and varied collection of Catan that shows the power and positive strengths of the game I am passionate about, including a collection of the more unusual Catan sets.
- To collect the Catan base set in as many languages as possible.
So how am I doing?
ENGLISH SETS
I want a complete set of official Catan English language products as this is my native language. While there are many wonderful items only released in German (of which I have many) a complete English collection remains my primary goal. My progress has been good and at one stage I was down to just 6 items to go. Then I made three mistakes.
The first (and most annoying was recently giving away my 2016 Catan Studio set of Traders & Barbarians (expansion and 5/6 player) when I meant to give away my spare Mayfair set. So now I need to replace them.
My second mistake was visiting my local game shop and seeing that the 5th edition of Catan now has a third printing with the copyright date 2019, so now I need a set of these too.
My third mistake was visiting the Catan website (as I do most days in fact) and seeing that there are four items that are to be released this year. The display stand is not an official product as such, but I am keen to buy one if I can find a game shop that has finished with theirs.
So I went from needing 6 items:to needing 20 items in a short period of time:
- 2020 - Starfarers 5/6 Player extension (To be released)
- 2020 - 'Return to Catan' Shop Display Stand
- 2019 - Catan: Cities & Knights 5-6 player CSv3
- 2019 - Rise of the Inkas Corrected Longest Trade Route 2:1 Card.
- 2019 - Catan: Seafarers CSv3 2019
- 2019 - Catan: Seafarers 5-6 player CSv3
- 2019 - Catan: Explorers & Pirates 5-6 player CSv3
- 2019 - Catan: Explorers & Pirates CSv3
- 2019 - Catan: Traders and Barbarians 5-6 player CSv3
- 2016 - Traders and Barbarians - CSv2
- 2016 - Traders and Barbarians 5/6 player - CSv2
- 2016 - The Rivals for Catan v4
- 2016 - Struggle For Catan: City Expansion – Cathedral ‐ English edition
- 2015 - Catan Geographies – Hispania (English version)
- 2005 - Catan: Catakatoa Promotional Card Game Trader Issue 61
- 2001 - Geographic Discipline Model - Buckland Games
Added to this of course are the abundance of official promotional items and many unofficial extensions and scenarios that seem to keep appearing on a regular basis. I am quite sure I will never be fully complete.
FOREIGN SETS
As well as my English set, there are still the special releases I want sets of too. Currently I have two of the three 3D 10th Anniversary set languages, I have all four languages of the Ancient Egypt sets, and three of the 15th Anniversary sets. But I still want to complete the other languages that make up these releases.
So the foreign language products I am still seeking are:
- Catan 3D 10th Anniversary Dutch set
- De Kolonisten van Catan: 15 jaar Deluxe ‐ Dutch edition (2010)
- Los Colonos de Catán 15th ‐ Spanish edition (2010)
- Taistelu Roomasta (Rome) ‐ Kosmos Finnish edition (2007)
- La conquête de Rome (Rome) ‐ French edition (2006)
- Поселенцы: Битва за Рим (Rome) ‐ Russian edition
- The Settlers fra Catan: Historiske Scenarier ‐ Danish (1998)
- Catan: 25 jaar wereldwijd jubileum ‐ Dutch edition (2020)
- Catan. Юбилейное издание 25th ‐ Russian edition (2020)
- Каменный век (Stone Age) ‐ Russian edition
- Settlers fra Catan: Europa ‐ Bergsala Enigma Danish edition (2012) (red flag)
- Settlers fra Catan: Europa ‐ Bergsala Enigma Norwegian edition (2012) (red flag)
- Osadnicy z Catanu: Na podbój Europy ‐ Polish edition (2012)
- Colonistii din Catan Europa ‐ Romanian edition (2012)
- Catan Historias: Los Colonos de Europa ‐ Spanish edition (2012)
- Колонизаторы: Европа. ‐ Russian edition
- Колонизаторы. Америка (America)‐ Russian edition (2014)
- Catan Historias: Los Colonos de América ‐ Spanish edition (2012)
- Catan Histories: I Coloni d'America ‐ Italian edition
INTERNATIONAL BASE SETS
While I always said I would not get into collecting international sets, I have changed my mind and am now keen to have the base Catan set in as many languages as possible. Currently I am aware that sets are available in the following 38 languages:
Afrikaans, Arabic, Basque, Brazilian, Bulgarian, Catalan, Chinese, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Icelandic, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, Taiwanese, Thai, and Turkish. (* Red indicates the languages I know I am missing)
Thanks to the very kind people at Kosmos who have helped me with the Arabic set, and thanks to my ever resourceful friend and Catan dealer Erwin, I have now managed to obtain 36 of these. This will be an area I will have to keep monitoring.
SUMMARY
So as you can see I still have a way to go before I could claim to have a complete collection of English Catan, and even further before I have all the items I want.
This just means I have many more years of fun ahead of playing and collecting my favourite game.
I also welcome approaches from anyone who can help me find the missing items. Even if it is only a lead on where you think might be a copy, I am willing to do the detective work to track it down.