>Many years ago when I first met this friend we played Catan together
>I hated it
>We still get along, play other games, and have a good time
>Keep hanging out together
>Every few hangouts he tries pushing for us to play Catan again
>I always refuse
>Every time he swears that the game is 100x better with the Cities & Knights expansion
>Still refuse
>Fast forward many years
>He asks to play Catan again
>Fuck it, fine I'll finally do it
>We play it
>Friend's wheat tile gets rolled every other turn
>He plays merchant on said tile
>makes a wheat trading factory
>His turns take 3x as long as anyone else as he trades for everything he needs at 2:1 ratio
>Blows through the upgrade tree
>Swimming in progress cards
>We try to robber him
>Anytime we do he'll roll a 7 and move it elsewhere
>Someone else gets a merchant card
>They move the merchant off his wheat factory
>He moves it back the next turn
>I play a card to look at his hand
>Fucker had two more Merchant cards
>We try to get the barbarians to attack to raze his cities as he's fairly defenseless
>Move the barbarian track up to one away
>From that point onward no one can roll the barbarians anymore
>Last turn involves him playing 3 cards back to back royally screwing the player with the longest road so they can claim victory
Lord Almighty do I hate Catan.
That said, I'll concede that Cities & Knights was indeed better than base Catan.