“How often does distance rule FAIL happen to you?”

Probably it is.  Games aren’t copyrightable.

The name under which a game set is published, the tile art, the package design, typeface, colour scheme, the piece of writing that is the rulebook, all those are subject to copyright.  And he hasn’t copied those things.

The rules themselves, and those physical elements of the design that need to be retained to be able to follow the rules, are fine to copy.

Anyone remember Scrabblicious (or whatever it was called) on facebook?  They got in trouble because they retained copyrightable elements from Scrabble – the colours, typefaces, and a very similar name, notably.  They could have offered the same rules, gameplay, and board layout, under a different  name and with different graphic design, and they’d have been fine.

“Settlers  of Satan” – a modern age expansion for “Settlers of Catan”

* new asset: influence – it’s tradeable like grain or wood
* lose your draw, your right to bargain or even your whole turn in exchange
   for influence
* use influence to have the other players’ calvinist settlers build camouflaged casinos instead of sawmills, run hidden bordellos in mines and work in secret drug labs at their farms
* gain a percentage of everything the targeted player produces
* your victory condition: have  another settler “win” the game – if you receive more than 25% of his production/income, you are settler supreme 

Also that board looks really, really nice.

http://www.settlersboard.com/settlers-replacement-board.html

Less handmade appeal, but functional nonetheless.

But seriously, pahool is absolutely right. I’ve been playing Cities&Knights (is it called that in America, too? not sure) since… I dunno, 2000? and refused to play vanilla ever since. It just adds incredible ammounts of depth with relatively little changes.
The seafaring-addition (again, not sure about the english name), otoh, isn’t a must for me. I’ll play it, but it adds to much luck-based elements for my taste.

There is a frame-only reward for $60. Fits the Mayfair tiles quite nicely. Pics:
http://ezide.com/showcase/frame_showcase.html

Re: color, I’ve tried staining but I don’t think it looks as nice:
http://boardcrafting.com/in-living-color

And in my playtests, it takes people about 30-45 seconds to get familiar with what the tiles represent. Beginners have less trouble adapting because my tiles represent the resources, not terrain where such resources come from.

Done properly, I think he could skip making the hex tiles, and just design his board so that the cardboard hex tiles from the original game either snap in, or slide in, somehow, into their spaces.  My original set’s hex tiles are all still flat enough, the only problems I have with the existing board are the border pieces, which were curved right out of the box, and the fact that there’s nothing holding the hex tiles together.

Actually, I find the 3D printed tiles that were featured here on BB some months ago to be even sexier, and more functional than this laser-cut wooden board, except that I don’t know how tight the printed pieces hang together.  But even that’s a minor problem, all you need is a flat piece of plastic, wood, cardboard, whatever, to go underneath.

“Licensing?”

Yes, the game is currently in print.  Mayfair games.  They sell it in stores.

“So why would this nice fellow with the laser cutter need to license it?”

Oh, I don’t know.  I’m sure the lawyers will let him know.

“But he’s added a disclaimer.  ’This project is in no way affiliated or endorsed by the publishers or trademark holders of the Settlers of Catan board game.’  Isn’t that enough?”

We’ll see.