Play Cities & Knights online, free
The whole expansion — commodities, knights, barbarians, 54 progress cards — in the browser, with no unlock.
Cities & Knights is the expansion most free sites either skip or sell. On New Shores it is simply one of the maps: open a room, pick Cities & Knights, and everything below is in play. This page is the short version of what changes and how to start; the complete rules are on the Cities & Knights rules page.
What changes from the base game
- Commodities. A city on forest, pasture or mountains pays one resource and one commodity — paper, cloth or coin — instead of two resources.
- City improvements. Three tracks (trade, politics, science) bought with commodities. Level 3 grants a permanent ability; level 4 founds a metropolis worth 2 VP; level 5 makes it permanent.
- Knights. Recruited for 1 ore + 1 wool, activated for 1 grain, promoted through three ranks. Active knights are the island's defence, and they can chase the robber or displace a weaker knight.
- The event die. Rolled with the two production dice. A barbarian face moves the ship a step along its seven-step track; a gate face pays progress cards to anyone whose track is high enough.
- The barbarian attack. Barbarian strength is the number of cities; defence is the sum of active knight levels. Win and the top contributor takes Defender of Catan (+1 VP). Lose and the weakest defenders each lose a city.
- Progress cards replace development cards: 54 of them, 25 distinct effects, drawn from the event die rather than bought.
- City walls raise your hand limit by two each, up to three. The robber does not act until the first barbarian attack has landed.
How to start one
- Open newshores.io, type a display name and press Play now.
- In the lobby, open the map browser and choose Cities & Knights under its own family.
- Invite 1–3 people with the room link, or seat bots. The game plays to 13 victory points.
- Setup places a settlement and then a city as your second building, each with a route — so you start at 3 VP with commodities flowing from turn one.
Three things new players get wrong
- An inactive knight defends nothing. Recruiting is half the cost; activating (1 grain) is what counts when the ship lands — and every attack deactivates every knight.
- The weakest defender loses a city, not the richest. If three players have 2 defence and you have 1, you alone are raided. Match the table, not the barbarians.
- Commodities only come from cities on the right terrain. A city on fields or hills pays two grain or two brick, never a commodity. Place your first city on forest, pasture or mountains.
Common questions
- Is Cities & Knights free on New Shores?
- Yes. The full rule set is included with no membership and no unlock. New Shores is an independent game and is not the official Cities & Knights product.
- Are all the progress cards implemented?
- Yes — all 54 cards across the trade, politics and science decks, including the awkward ones (Commercial Harbor, Spy, Wedding, Deserter) with their real prompts.
- How many players?
- 2 to 4 on the 19-hex board, to 13 victory points. Every player starts with a settlement and a city, so the barbarians have targets from turn one.
- Do the bots play Cities & Knights?
- Yes. Bots recruit and activate knights, buy improvements, answer every prompt the expansion can throw at a player, and never stall the table.
- Does it work on a phone?
- Yes. The phone layout keeps the board full-screen with a barbarian bar above your dice, knight strength on every player chip, and the improvement tracks one tap away.
New Shores is an independent project. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, sponsored by or connected to Catan GmbH, Catan Studio, Colonist or any other game publisher. Other games are named only to describe what kind of game this is and to compare it honestly.