Knights in the City: Tournament Strategy Cheat Sheet (Cities & Knights) | Deep Dive AI

Knights in the City: Tournament Strategy Cheat Sheet

There’s a moment in every Cities & Knights game where the table gets quiet—not because anyone is thinking, but because everyone just realized the barbarians are two ships away and the guy across from you has been hoarding grain like it’s a pension fund.

This post is the “stop panicking, start piloting” version of tournament play. It’s not a vibe. It’s a checklist. A tempo plan. A way to win without accidentally building a beautiful engine that dies the instant the ships land.

1) The Core Meta: Mastering the Three Clocks

Competitive dominance comes from syncing three interlocking timelines. Great players don’t “react to dice.” They manage tempo by playing the Expected Value of the game’s three clocks.

Clock A: Barbarians (The Threat Clock)

Event die: 3 ship faces = 50% chance per turn of advancement.
Golden Ratio rule: keep your active knight strength at exactly +1 above the barbarian floor (and above rivals when it matters). That’s how you farm Defender VPs without burning your whole economy in “just in case” activations.
Why this matters: Overspending on defense is how you lose to the player who quietly locks a metropolis and strolls to 13.

Clock B: Progress (The Engine Clock)

FIRST FLIP FIRST. Your first improvement is the engine switch that turns “no cards” into “cards happen.” Delaying it is basically donating future options to the table.

Levels 1–2: 1/6 (16.7%) chance of a progress card draw per matching gate.
Level 3+: 2/6 (33.3%) chance via additional red die icons.

Clock C: Metropolises (The Closure Clock)

Metropolis value: a concentrated 4 VP (2 for city + 2 for metropolis).
Level 5 “locks” it: immune to barbarians and permanently sticky.
Sticky rule in plain English: if someone reaches Level 5 and takes your metropolis, you’re not getting it back. Ever. Not even with a heroic speech.

Strategic Mnemonics (The ones you’ll actually remember)

GRAIN = GAS

Grain is the bottleneck. No grain → no activations → no defense → you lose cities → your whole tempo collapses. Every grain you spend must buy real EV: defense, board control, or VP.

FIRST FLIP FIRST

Your first improvement turns your progress draw probability from 0% to “live.” If you delay, you’re letting opponents compound card advantage and information. That’s how you get outplayed by someone who looks relaxed for suspicious reasons.

DEFEND → DRAW → DOMINATE

Barbarian attacks are not just “bad things.” They’re VP-generation windows (Defender of Catan) and tactical resets (knights go inactive, everyone rebalances). Use that reset to re-budget grain for the next cycle.

2) Opening Placement Rubric

Tournament placement is not “gut feel.” It’s a mechanical scorecard. Be boring. Win anyway.

City-Site Selection Rubric

Points	Strategic Rationale
+3	Adjacent to Grain on high-frequency numbers (6, 8, 5, 9).
+2	Adjacent to Ore on strong numbers (knight promotions).
+2	Matches your intended track: Forest (Science), Pasture (Trade), Mountains (Politics).
+2	Touches two different commodity terrains (diversifies engine; reduces trade leakage).
-5	Hard constraint: zero grain adjacency = critical failure. (Starvation risk.)

Settlement-Site Selection Rubric

+3 Adds missing Wood/Brick (mobility and expansion lanes).
+2 Adds missing Wool/Ore (knight production + promotion).
+2 Strengthens grain reliability (activation + city building).
+2 Creates a realistic second settlement lane within two road placements.

Quick-Reference: Opening Archetypes

Archetype	Strengths	Failure Mode	Selection Criteria
Science Tempo	Fast card access; Aqueduct stability.	Weak defense if grain is thin.	Secure grain + at least one paper city.
Politics Control	Mighty Knights; metropolis threat.	Stalls if coin/trade dries up.	Reliable coin + ability to contest lanes.
Trade Economy	2:1 commodity trades; Merchant/Guild leverage.	Vulnerable to bullying/blockades.	High cloth supply; trade-active table.
Defender Grinder	High Defender VP frequency.	Over-invests; lacks closure.	Fragile board + high grain access.
Long-road Closer	Fast expansion; 2-VP road threat.	Falls behind in engine/draws.	Only if an early flip is also viable.

3) Critical Timing & Rule Constraints (Don’t get DQ’d by accident)

Pre-First-Attack Robber Rules

Robber is “out of play” until the first barbarian landing.
7s still trigger discards: if you’re over the limit, you discard half.
No movement/stealing: robber stays in the desert.
No intervention: no Bishop, no knight chase, no “but my card says—”. Not yet.

Knight Economics Checklist

Activation cost: 1 Grain.
Promotion cost: 1 Wool + 1 Ore per step (active/inactive status stays the same during promotion).
Same-turn prohibition: you can build + activate on the same turn, but that knight cannot act (move, displace, chase robber) until your next turn.
Action reset: after any action, a knight immediately becomes inactive.

4) The Knight Economy: Activation Priorities

Your “activation budget” is the difference between farming Defender VPs and watching your city get reduced while you hold three wool and a dream.

Priority	Scenario	Action
MUST-DO	Barbarians imminent; you are lowest active strength.	Activate enough to avoid being the target of city loss.
MUST-DO	You can secure Defender of Catan VP.	Activate to exceed nearest rival by +1.
HIGH	Robber is live on a high-frequency hex.	Activate positioned knight to chase (remove robber + steal).
MEDIUM	Chance to break a rival lane / interrupt Longest Road.	Activate strongest knight to displace.
LOW	“Just in case” activations with no imminent threat.	Hold grain. Don’t burn fuel on low-EV moves.

Pro-tip: The Panic Knight Trap. If you wait until the robber hits you to build, your new knight is a decorative statue for a full round. Same-turn action prohibition doesn’t care about your feelings.

5) The Three-Track Decision Framework

Level 3 is where your midgame stops being “hope” and starts being a conversion engine.

Track	Level 3 Ability	Conversion Function
Trade	Trading House	2:1 commodity trades (on your turn).
Politics	Fortress	Enables promotion to Mighty Knights.
Science	Aqueduct	If no production on non-7 roll, take 1 resource of choice.

Tactical Ranking of Progress Cards

Alchemist (Science, 2 copies): highest decision leverage. Choose both production dice results to time endgame conversions or a Defender swing.
Inventor (Science, 2 copies): permanent board reshaping. Swap weak city numbers for strong ones.
Monopolies (Trade, 6 copies total): massive resource swings. Track these to sniff out metropolis locks and city bursts.
Merchant (Trade): 1 VP + 2:1 trade on a resource. Note: the VP is stealable by any opponent playing Merchant.
Deserter / Diplomat / Spy (Politics): disruption, information, and knight strength theft—aka “polite chaos.”

6) Metropolis Strategy: Lock or Ignore

A metropolis is contestable at Level 4 but irreversible at Level 5. This is a binary decision. Pick a path. Don’t half-date a metropolis.

Plan Lock (Commit)

Secure a matching commodity source.
Treat Level 4 as a temporary vulnerability window.
Hoard commodities to burst from Level 4 → 5 in a single turn and lock the 4-VP asset.

Plan Ignore (Diversify)

Accept an opponent’s lock without donating more commodities to the race.
Pivot to alternative VP sources: Defender points, Longest Road, Merchant control, VP progress cards (Constitution/Printer).

7) The Two-Offer Protocol & Negotiation Tactics

Trading is where information leaks. Your job is to control the dialogue so you don’t accidentally narrate your win condition out loud.

The Two-Offer Protocol

Offer A (Premium): “I’ll give [High Value] for [Resource] right now.” (Signals urgency and immediate conversion.)
Offer B (Fair Swap): “Or we can do a standard swap later in the round.”

The New Flips Embargo

Never trade a commodity to a player who hasn’t flipped Level 1 on that track. Don’t hand them the engine switch for free. Make them pay in position, lanes, or defense commitments.

Future-Option Frame

Use if/then: “If you trade me this grain now, I’ll prioritize trading you my ore next turn when I lock this port.” You’re not promising friendship. You’re selling a future option.

8) The Default Turn Algorithm

Follow this so you stop missing triggers and start feeling like the adult at the table.

Pre-roll check: evaluate Alchemist. Play if a defense/win swing is achievable.
Roll: all three dice.
Event resolution:
- Barbarians shore: resolve battle immediately; all knights become inactive.
- City gate match: draw progress card if your level and red die icon align.
Production: distribute resources/commodities.
Aqueduct (passive): if you have it and received no production (and not a 7), take 1 resource.
Action phase: trade/build/knight actions.
VP check: can you reach 13? If not, prioritize: (1) Defense, (2) First Flip, (3) Expansion.

9) Endgame Closure & Counterplay

Opponent Modeling Axis (Do this every round)

Defense: current active strength vs activation capacity (grain access).
Upgrades: current levels and lock proximity.
Closure threats: Longest Road, metropolis steals, Merchant control.
Trade dependency: identify the only supplier of a resource. That player is your Monopoly target or embargo candidate.

Common Mistakes & Recovery

Mistake: Grain starvation. Stop promotions. Pivot to grain port or use Irrigation to inject fuel.
Mistake: Losing the 4→5 metropolis race. Don’t waste more commodities. Switch to Plan Ignore; hunt Defender VPs + Merchant.
Mistake: Delaying the first knight. Trade hard for grain; keep active strength at least +1 over the lowest player.

10) Tournament Quick-Reference (The 60-Second Scan)

Standard Rule Assumptions

4 players; 13 VP to win.
Robber/Bishop/knight movement disabled until after first barbarian attack.
City Walls (+2 hand limit) do not protect against barbarian city reduction.

The One-Sentence Decision Tree

Survive landing → flip at least one track → build conversion engine (Aqueduct/Fortress/Trading House) → lock or ignore a metropolis → compress VP and end on your turn.

Victory Point Thresholds

City: 2 VP
Metropolis City: 4 VP
Defender of Catan: 1 VP
Longest Road: 2 VP
Merchant: 1 VP (stealable)
Progress VP cards (Constitution/Printer): 1 VP

Table Kit Addendum: Tournament Comfort + Speed (Affiliate Links)

If you’re using this cheat sheet at the table, here are a few “quality-of-life” upgrades that make tournament play smoother. None of these are required — they just reduce friction so your brain can stay on the Three Clocks instead of chasing components.

Cities & Knights Expansion (the core upgrade) — Check price
Card sleeves (protect progress cards + faster shuffling) — Check options
Organizer/insert (setup faster, teardown faster, fewer “where’s the…?” moments) — Check options
Board game playmat (quiet rolls, stable pieces, “tournament table” feel) — Check options
Bonus: “Victim Mentality” card (for when the dice are bullying you) — Check it out

Affiliate note: If you use these links, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Thanks for supporting Deep Dive AI.

Two quick CTAs

Want more “tournament brain” cheatsheets like this? Subscribe here: YouTube Subscribe
Want the audio version while you set up the board? Follow on Spotify: Deep Dive AI Podcast

Also: Watch the channel: Deep Dive AI on YouTube

Final thought: Cities & Knights rewards the player who spends grain like it’s gasoline, not confetti. Keep your clocks synced, flip early, lock late (or ignore on purpose), and end the game on your turn—before anyone else’s “one good roll” turns into your personal tragedy.

#Catan #CitiesAndKnights #BoardGameStrategy #TournamentPlay #Knights #Metropolis #ProgressCards