Tabletop games
Carcassonne
Z-Man GamesKlaus-Jürgen Wrede2000
- players
- 2–5
- minutes
- 45
- years
- 7+
In the box
72 land tiles (84 with the River and the Abbot, depending on the edition) · 40 followers in 5 colours · 1 score track
Official rules (PDF, publisher's site)
Box details
- Designer
- Klaus-Jürgen Wrede
- Artwork
- Marcel Gröber, Doris Matthäus, Anne Pätzke, Chris Quilliams
- Publisher
- Z-Man Games
- Mechanics
- Area MajorityEnclosureKill StealMap AdditionPattern Building
- Expansions
- Carcassonne: Inns & Cathedrals · 2025
- Carcassonne: Traders & Builders · 2025
- Carcassonne: Expansion 3 – The Princess & the Dragon · 2025
- Carcassonne: Expansion 4 – The Tower · 2025
- Carcassonne: Expansion 5 – Abbey & Mayor · 2016
Where to buy it
Near you and online
In a shop
Within 50 km.
Online
Affiliate link: Marquoir may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you.
The basics
Each player lays tiles to build roads, cities, monasteries and fields, and places followers on them at the right moment. On your turn, draw a tile, place it so that its edges match its neighbours, then you may put a follower on a feature that is still free; a completed feature is scored at the end of the turn and its followers return to their owners. When the last tile is placed, incomplete features and then fields are scored, and the highest total wins.
Checked against the official rules · September 2026
The rules, step by step
Setup
Start tile, 7 followers each, Youngest starts
- The start tile, with its dark back, is placed in the middle, face up. The other tiles are shuffled into several face-down piles.
- Each player takes seven followers (meeples) in their colour; an eighth one serves as a marker on the scoring track.
- The youngest player starts, then play goes clockwise.
How to play
Draw, place 1 tile, 1 follower at most, Unoccupied feature
- Draw a tile and place it so that its edges match the neighbouring tiles.
- You may then place a single follower from your supply, and only on the tile you have just placed: thief on a road, knight in a city, monk in a monastery, farmer lying down in a field.
- You cannot place a follower on a feature that is already occupied, even if the other follower is on a distant tile of the same feature.
- A completed feature is scored at the end of the turn, whichever player completed it, and its followers go back to their owners.
- If the tile you draw cannot be placed anywhere, put it back in the box and draw another one.
Scoring
Road 1 pt per tile, City 2 pts per tile, Field 3 per closed city
- Completed road, that is, closed at both ends: 1 point per tile.
- Completed city: 2 points per tile, plus 2 per pennant. Incomplete city at the end of the game: 1 point per tile and per pennant.
- Monastery: 1 point per tile in its square of nine, itself included, so 9 points once surrounded. Incomplete at the end of the game, it scores only the tiles placed.
- Field, at final scoring: 3 points per completed city it supplies.
- When several players occupy the same feature or the same field, only the player with the most followers there scores, and they score everything. In a tie, each of the tied players scores the full points.
End of the game
Last tile placed, Incomplete then fields, Highest total
- The game ends when the last tile is placed.
- All incomplete features are then scored, followed by the fields.
- The highest total wins; in a tie, the victory is shared.
House rules and pitfalls
Field scoring decides most games, and it is the one everyone forgets during play.
- Field scoring decides most games, and it is the one everyone forgets during play.
- The River mini-expansion, included in the box: its twelve dark-backed tiles are placed first, one after another, before the ordinary tiles. You never place a follower on them.
- The Abbot mini-expansion, included in the box: the abbot is placed on a monastery or a garden, which is scored like a monastery. On a turn in which you do not place a follower, you may call back your abbot and immediately score what its monastery or garden is worth at that moment.
Going further
Frequently asked questions · Rules on video · In the same family · Play with the game assistant
Frequently asked questions
Can you place a follower on a feature that is already occupied?
No, never directly. But two separate features, each with its own follower, can merge when a tile is placed between them: the feature then has two followers, and that is the only way to share one.
What happens when two players share the same feature?
On completion, each of them scores the full points, not half. If they do not have the same number of followers on it, the player with the most followers scores alone; in a tie, both score the total.
How do you get your followers back?
A completed feature returns its followers to their owners straight away, ready to be used again. A follower placed in a field, however, stays there until the end of the game: a field is never "completed".
How exactly do fields work?
A follower lying down in a field (the farmer) scores, at final scoring, 3 points per completed city that field touches. Two fields separated by a road or a city are distinct. It is the scoring everyone forgets, and the one that decides the game.
Do you have to place a follower every turn?
No. Placing a tile is compulsory, placing a follower is optional — and you often hold back to keep your seven followers available, because without a free follower you can no longer place one.
What if the tile you draw cannot be placed anywhere?
A very rare case. Show it to everyone, put it back in the box, and draw another one.
Rules on video
Videos in French, hosted on YouTube.