Carcassonne solitaire

I've played a lot of Carcassonne lately, thanks to Andrew, who first told me about this game. I'm even the reigning champion of Montserrat (ok, it was just the GB and me playing). Not many games are equally fun for 2 or 6 players.

When I can't find an opponent, I play solitaire Carcassonne, a version of my own invention. Remove everything but the basic set -- ditch the river, inns & cathedrals, dragon & princess, laurel & hardy, etc. Forget the meeples; you won't need 'em. Start with the starting piece and play tiles one at time. Your goal is to get a complete city, surrounded by a ring-road around the city, surrounded by an unbroken chain of completed cities around the ring-road, surrounded by another ring-road around the chain of cities. Oh yes, it can be done; I did it the first time I tried, although I have never repeated the accomplishment. Sometimes I'm just a tile or two short.

Scoring makes it more interesting. Count your innermost city as usual. If it is surrounded by a ring-road, add in any other complete features (monasteries and cities only), double the total, and add a point for every tile in the ring-road. If the road is surrounded, add in any other features, double the running total, and score the ring-cities as normal. If the ring-cities are surrounded, repeat the process. I've scored over 200 points.