Ruling — Catan — RuleSage

You asked

How do I setup the game?

Answered counted as answered

Asked with: Catanbg-13-en-1e

1. Remove the die-cut components from the cardboard holders and carefully punch out and separate the pieces [1]. 2. Build the game map [2]. 3. Assemble the frame [1][3]. 4. Place the 19 terrain hexes on the table [1] (or exactly as shown in Illustration R [3]). 5. Place the circular number tokens on top of the designated terrain hexes [1]. 6. Everyone chooses a color and takes the corresponding game pieces: 5 settlements, 4 cities, and 15 roads [4][2]. 7. Place 2 roads and 2 settlements of each color on the game board [4][3] (if playing with 3 players, nobody plays the red position/remove the red pieces [4][3]). 8. Place remaining settlements, roads, and cities in front of you [4]. 9. Take your color's building costs card [4]. 10. Place the 'Longest Road' and 'Largest Army' special cards beside the game board along with the 2 dice [4]. 11. Sort the resource cards into 5 stacks and put them face up next to the game board [4]. 12. Shuffle the development cards and place them face down by the board [4]. 13. Take the appropriate resource cards from the stacks for each terrain hex around your starting settlement marked with a white star H [4][3].

[1] RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook · p.2 · Starting Set-up for Beginners

[2] RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook · p.12 · set-up phase

[3] RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook · p.13 · startinG set-up for BeGinners

[4] RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook · p.3 · settinG up the Game

Strategy guides → — community tips, kept separate from rulings

🔧 debug — where this ruling came from

outcome: ANSWERED — Answered
corpus profile: live
answerer pin (deploy-frozen, attribution only): gemma4:26b think:false 5571076f3d70
timings: search 223 ms · ask 9256 ms · total 9491 ms
single-flight (PR-5): queued 0 ms · generation 9491 ms
retrieval refs (raw): [{"page": 2, "score": 0.048172, "snippet": "You can play the game Catan on a variable game board. For your first game, however, we suggest that you use the 'Starting Set-up for Beginners Y .' (See Illus. A on page 3.) This set-up is well-balanced for all players. Before your first game, you must remove the die-cut components from the cardboar", "headingPath": "Starting Set-up for Beginners", "sharpsignalDocId": 43}, {"page": 8, "score": 0.047643, "snippet": "Here is a summary of the the game sequence, plus some more specific entries where you can find details: Lay out the game board: Set-up, Variable Y Initial set-up: Set-up Phase Y Play The starting player begins the game. The other players follow in clockwise order. On your turn, you complete these 3 ", "headingPath": "Game play", "sharpsignalDocId": 43}, {"page": 3, "score": 0.047619, "snippet": "Select a color and take your 5 settlements, 4 cities, and 15 roads (no more and no less!). Place your 2 roads and your 2 settlements on the game board. Place your remaining settlements, roads, and cities down in front of you. Note: If you are playing a 3-player game, nobody plays the red position in", "headingPath": "settinG up the Game", "sharpsignalDocId": 43}, {"page": 13, "score": 0.047183, "snippet": "If you want to use the starting set-up, lay out the board as shown in Illustration R (and the Game Overview): Assemble the frame exactly as shown in Illustration R. Place the terrain hexes exactly as shown in Illustration R. Place 2 settlements and 2 roads of each color as shown. If only 3 are playi", "headingPath": "startinG set-up for BeGinners", "sharpsignalDocId": 43}, {"page": 12, "score": 0.046898, "snippet": "Begin the 'set-up phase' after you build the game map (see Illustration N and Set-up, Variable Y ). Everyone chooses a color and takes the corresponding game pieces: 5 settlements; 4 cities;", "headingPath": "set-up phase", "sharpsignalDocId": 43}, {"page": 3, "score": 0.045455, "snippet": "It is more fun to play with a variable game board-with the game board laid out randomly. The board changes each game. If you would like to use the variable set-up, you can find the guidelines in the Almanac under Set-up, Variable Y . Also look for useful tips under Set-up Phase Y and Tactics Y .", "headingPath": "Starting Set-up for Experienced Players", "sharpsignalDocId": 43}, {"page": 12, "score": 0.029851, "snippet": "Suggested Beginners' Map Set-up 15 roads; and 1 building costs card. Sort the resource cards into 5 stacks and place them face up beside the board. Shuffle the development cards Y and place them face down beside the resource cards. Place the 2 special cards and the dice beside the board. Place the r", "headingPath": "Illustration N", "sharpsignalDocId": 43}, {"page": 2, "score": 0.029412, "snippet": "To make it as easy as possible for you to start playing Catan® , we use an award-winning rules system, which consists of 3 parts. First, if you do not know how to play Catan , please read the Game Overview on page 16 (the back cover). Next, read the Game Rules on pages 2-6 (red borders) and start to", "headingPath": "Dear Settlers,", "sharpsignalDocId": 43}]
citations (raw): [{"page": 2, "quote": null, "headingPath": "Starting Set-up for Beginners", "sharpsignalDocId": 43}, {"page": 12, "quote": null, "headingPath": "set-up phase", "sharpsignalDocId": 43}, {"page": 13, "quote": null, "headingPath": "startinG set-up for BeGinners", "sharpsignalDocId": 43}, {"page": 3, "quote": null, "headingPath": "settinG up the Game", "sharpsignalDocId": 43}]
boost provenance — errata + base rulebook (E2/E3): no registered errata card matched this query; base rulebook doc 43 boosted; rulesage.errata.boost-enabled=true, rulesage.errata.supersedence-enabled=true
base rulebook doc 43 boosted
answered-before recall: this ruling was answered, so past rulings were not offered
similarity threshold in force: 0.55 (rulesage.answered-before.similarity-threshold; the exact-question tier is not gated by it)
debug row retained until: Nov 3, 2026 05:10

retrieval — what the search arm returned

score = the fused retrieval score (reciprocal-rank fusion over the search arms) — NOT a cosine similarity. This ruling ran the THREE-ARM fuse (full-text + vector + the doc-priority boost arm, which carried the base rulebook and/or the errata corrections this query matched), whose arithmetic ceiling is 0.04918 — all three arms ranking the same chunk #1 (ceiling = arms/(k+1) at k=60). The measured healthy band 0.016–0.033 was measured on TWO-arm asks and does not bound this one: its high end is the two-arm ceiling, and a third arm has room above it. A chunk only one arm ranked highly lands near 0.016 (that one arm's #1 vote), so 0.03 here is an excellent hit, not a 3% match.

per-arm ranks (the rank each search arm gave a chunk): NOT DISCLOSED by the gateway. Fusion happens gateway-side and only the FUSED score crosses the wire, so rulesage cannot show them without a gateway change. The rank column below is the FUSED rank (position in the returned list), which is real.

token count per chunk: NOT DISCLOSED — chunk token counts are not reported on the ask path. The character counts below are of the bounded snippet/quote rulesage actually received — a real measurement of what we hold, never an estimate of the chunk.

fused rank	document	heading	page	fused RRF score	snippet chars
#1	RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook (corpus doc 43)	Starting Set-up for Beginners	p.2	0.048172 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#2	RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook (corpus doc 43)	Game play	p.8	0.047643 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#3	RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook (corpus doc 43)	settinG up the Game	p.3	0.047619 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#4	RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook (corpus doc 43)	startinG set-up for BeGinners	p.13	0.047183 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#5	RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook (corpus doc 43)	set-up phase	p.12	0.046898 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	190
#6	RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook (corpus doc 43)	Starting Set-up for Experienced Players	p.3	0.045455 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	296
#7	RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook (corpus doc 43)	Illustration N	p.12	0.029851 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#8	RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook (corpus doc 43)	Dear Settlers,	p.2	0.029412 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300

chosen chunks — what the answer actually cited

#	document	heading	page	quote chars
[1]	RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook (corpus doc 43)	Starting Set-up for Beginners	p.2	no quote on the wire
[2]	RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook (corpus doc 43)	set-up phase	p.12	no quote on the wire
[3]	RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook (corpus doc 43)	startinG set-up for BeGinners	p.13	no quote on the wire
[4]	RULEBOOK Catan — Rulebook (corpus doc 43)	settinG up the Game	p.3	no quote on the wire

generation — timing and the path taken

timing split: retrieval 223 ms · first delta 7341 ms · total 9491 ms (retrieval and first-delta both measured from the START of gateway work, so first-delta INCLUDES retrieval — do not subtract)
full breakdown: queued 0 ms · retrieval 223 ms · ask 9256 ms · gateway work 9491 ms · total 9491 ms
tokens in (the prompt the answerer read): 1473
tokens out (what the answerer generated): 313
tok/sec: 150.2 tok/sec — 313 output tokens in 2.084 s of generation
live seat (read from the running child): answering — gemma4:26b think:false · num_ctx 32768 (live-verified 25s ago)
stream path: streamed — the gateway pushed at least one accumulated draft
watchdog: first-token watchdog: 30s per arming window (rulesage.table.first-token-watchdog-seconds), re-armed once by the passages frame — so the worst case before a reader falls back to polling is 60s. Whether it actually fired is a BROWSER-side decision that never reaches the server, so it is not recorded here. The stream path above is the server's half of that story: whether a delta was emitted at all.
num_ctx · think posture: both are the CHILD's settings, not rulesage's, and no ask reply carries them — an answer never states which context window or think posture produced it. The live-seat line above reads them from the running child instead, where the gateway can answer for itself; it describes the child NOW, not this ask.

disposition

outcome: ANSWERED — Answered
abstain rationale (n/a — this ruling answered): answered — no abstain rationale applies

setup-shape — why the checklist band did or didn't render

decision: SERVED — setup-shaped and this game's approved setup checklist is offered above
pattern that matched: SETUP — "setup" / "set up"
matched words (in the normalized question): setup

errata registry — what the gate above had to match against

this game registers NO errata cards (edition 1), so "no registered errata card matched" above could never have matched one

Errata scope: the gate above matched this ruling's own edition only. When an ask also reads an expansion, that expansion's own registered errata cards stay outside the match — a stated phase-1 limitation, not a failed lookup.