Game: Age of Steam Expansion - Disco Inferno / Soul Train

Thread: Age of Steam Soul Train session report

dedefortin — 2008-01-03T20:31:11+00:00

We had play 1 game on this map and we were 5 players and the experience wasn't very good so decided to try it again and this time we hope it would be easier as we know understand the consequence of having a nice network for the second stage of the game.

On turn 1, the bets went very high with Mario winning at 8$. Everybody started their network in the middle part of the map. On turn 2 Pierre was still the last to play and he was the only player to build completely to the south of the map. On this same turn there was a big fight to connect Terra but Marc-Andre was able to connect Clarkton to block Martin and Mario from this side of the map. As soon as turn 3, we had a hard time delivering goods since not many players were building in the Hell area. On turn 4 players were preparing their network for the last stage of the game and Martin build many nice links close to heaven and seemed to be the best prepared for the build that would follow in heaven. As expected stage 2 of the game (Heaven) happened on turn 5 and Marc-Andre won the important first build action and was able to place and link 2 of the new cities in the western part of heaven. Marc-Andre made nice deliveries of 6 income by using Martin's network several times. Pierre took the engineer action to link some cities in the east of Heaven but there wasn't enough goods available to catch up with Marc-Andre. Marc-Andre's move of blocking the western part of Earth paid of in the end as Mario and Martin shiiped many goods through his network.

This game was easier than our first but our next game on this map will be played with 4 players only. That's what we said after our first game on this but I suppose we still didn't had enough difficulties. The game still very tough but I'll reserve my final verdict after a 4 players game. Players usually prefer real theme related map but we were able to forget that goods represent soul and play a normal game. After all when you play Age of Steam since a long time you can pass over some details.

Final scoring:
Marc-Andre: 79
Pierre; 52
Martin: 39
Mario: 30
Nathalie: 0

Thread: Re: Disco Inferno - Moving Dancers (goods)

100%Blade — 2007-11-26T21:01:13+00:00

Thanks Ted. We played it correctly then. Good map which it's only taken us over a year to get to the table!

Thread: Re: Disco Inferno - Moving Dancers (goods)

toulouse — 2007-11-25T01:58:57+00:00

You can move "back" along the same track as long as it is with a different good. Think of each goods delivery as a separate AoS delivery, with each of the rules applying independently to each delivery.

Thread: Disco Inferno - Review

100%Blade — 2007-11-22T14:31:04+00:00

The Disco Inferno map for Age of Steam is not as weird as it sounds. Yes it’s been re-themed from a game about railroads and the board is predominantly a garish firey orange but the core rules have not been changed as much as, say, New York Subway that we also played recently. The key differences are

• The cities are now Discothèques and have been re-named along the lines of ‘Quincy’, ‘Chic’ and ‘Gaynor’ (with the towns being called ‘Dancing Queen, Copacabana etc) The cubes for shipping are no longer goods but instead are ‘dancers’ who move between Discos

• Four cubes are placed on each Disco at the start of the game and 3 on each urbanisation disco with no goods placed on the growth display for adding to the board each turn.

• Dancers can be moved in a ‘chain reaction’ providing you have the engine size. Thus if, for example, you have a five loco then you can move a red dancer 2 links to a red disco and then pick up a blue dancer there and move it 3 links to a blue disco. At first this seemed like it made shipping easier (and I think it does promote higher scores) but it can have a detrimental effect towards the end of the game as dancers start to become scarce if you have moved more than one a turn regularly.

• ‘Burn Baby, Burn’: When all dancers are removed from a disco then the discothèque burns down and a black tile is placed on it so that it can no longer be used as a destination for dancers (although it still counts as a link for passing through).. This is probably the biggest change and one you have to be very careful of as the dancer you have been nurturing away in the corner of the board ready for that big ‘6’ move may no longer have a discothèque to visit.

• Production has changed slightly in that you can select two new dancers and place them directly on one disco (instead of adding them to the goods display)

• Note that there is also a written rule that says anyone caught humming or singing a disco song when it’s not their turn loses 1 income. I guess the rules lawyers amongst you will insist on this but if we did, at least one of our group would go bankrupt very early in the game! (How does YMCA go again…..)

Strategy for this map is not significantly different to standard AoS with locomotive and urbanisation being the most sought after actions. If anything, these are slightly more important than normal as the chain reaction rule means that making full use of a large engine is easier and the risk of discos burning down and the additional dancers a new one automatically brings with it mean that Urbanisation is also key - particularly towards the end of the game when dancers and Discos may be scarce. This may mean issuing more shares to try and ensure you get on or other of these actions but it is also true that it is easier to make a profit than on some maps.

Someone on this site said that the map is best for 4 people but there is plenty of space around and although this is the only number we have played with, I would say that it would still play well with 6 with possibly 5 being the optimum number. I thought it was one of the better maps we have played with the discos burning down making it tough towards the end and the chain reaction rule not quite as friendly as it first seems. If/when we get away from playing new maps then this would certainly be one of the first ones I would want to try again.

Thread: Disco Inferno - Moving Dancers (goods)

100%Blade — 2007-11-21T16:57:13+00:00

If you use chain reaction can you second Dancer go back along track which the previous Dancer travelled along. The rules talk about being able to visit the same dischoteque but are not specific about using track.
e.g. If I have a 2 locomotive can I move a red good from a blue city one link to a red city then move a blue good on that city straight back to the initial city?
Thanks

Thread: Re: All track must begin and end in a town or city?

toulouse — 2007-09-02T16:26:15+00:00

To clarify:

This particular point is indeed the same as Germany's "complete links" where you can't have any stubs.

The primary reason for inclusion of this rule is it would be too easy to "octopus" (what we call building out all the sides of a town or city to prevent other players from getting to that town/city) with six tiles per turn. It also adds additional strategy to the last two turns, where six tiles may get you to a city, but doesn't give you the ability to lock other players out of the few cities that are available in heaven.

You can't start building from a town unless you're already linked to that town with your own track, just as in standard AoS.

Ted

Thread: Re: All track must begin and end in a town or city?

Thommy8 — 2007-09-02T15:09:08+00:00

Thanks to both of you. So now I understand that it means that you must build complete links (and can't leave a link partially completed on one turn so you can finish it on a later turn). However, does it also suggest that you can build with an endpoint in a town, and no endpoint in a city... not sure when you'd want to do this, but could you build a complete link from a town to another town? If I'm not mistaken, that is not allowed under the Rust Belt rules, but seems like it might be allowed under the Soul Train rules, no?

Thread: Re: All track must begin and end in a town or city?

Warbanner — 2007-09-02T05:28:21+00:00

It's a restriction. I haven't played Germany or Italy, so I can't compare, but it's actually a very tight restriction.

When building into towns, for instance, you'll have to make them 'dead ends' (i.e. the towns will have just one trackside connection, not the more typical 2). Of course, if you want to then continue them next turn, that'll cost you and additional $3, so that the hex will run you $5 in total. On the other hand, since you want to urbanize every turn in Soul Train, that decreases the number of times this will be a problem.

Thread: Re: All track must begin and end in a town or city?

KentuckyKid — 2007-09-02T02:50:08+00:00

Hi Tom,

I've only played Disco Inferno out of this expansion, so I must confess: I don't know. But after a quick reading of the rule in question, I'll put my money on (a) only build complete links (a la Germany).
Best,
-Darin

Thread: All track must begin and end in a town or city?

Thommy8 — 2007-09-02T02:25:54+00:00

Ted Alspach did a fantastic job with the rules for both of these expansion. I just finished reading the rules for both, and have only one minor question.

In the rules for Soul Train, it says "All track must begin and end in a town or city." What exactly does this mean? Is this a restriction beyond the normal AoS rules or an expansion of what's allowed? My interpretation for the latter is that you can now start building from a town and don't need to have an endpoint in a city. My interpretation for the former is that (like Germany or Italy, I believe those are the right two I'm thinking of) you must build complete links each turn. Or perhaps it's both combined, expanding upon what's allowed and limiting it? Or neither? Thanks for the clarification!

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caesarmom — 2007-08-08T15:06:38+00:00

Much bitterness at PLAY 2007

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toulouse — 2007-07-23T05:46:03+00:00

Age of Steam: Disco Inferno & Soul Train logos

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Allopes — 2007-06-13T18:06:58+00:00

Four-player endgame - lots of 'discos' closed

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Allopes — 2007-06-13T18:05:51+00:00

Meeples instead of cubes - it works better when you have to move dancers

Thread: Re: Age of Steam Soul Train session report

Barkam — 2007-05-29T04:01:23+00:00

I really wouldn't suggest this game with 5 players. It is already tight with 4 players. I don't think you should play this map with 3 players either. You need two people on each side of hell competing against each other. Otherwise, you'll have a runaway leader with the uncontested player.

Thread: Age of Steam Soul Train session report

dedefortin — 2007-05-29T02:34:40+00:00

We didn't have the chance to try this new map yet and as we were fivr players there seems to be enough space for this number of players. Some players were surprised with the thematic of this map but when began to play it was soon forgot and we concentrated on the game without thinking about the souls, hell or paradise. After explaning the rules it seemed very clear that we would have a tough time.

On round 1 Adrien won the bet at 4$ and most of the players started in the middle of the map. Even with so many players it was surprising to see how close we were to each other. In the next round, each player had to take 2 or 3 shares to survive. Pierre participated in the second round of betting as he declared he had too much money and he didn't know what to do with all this money ! Mario won the urbanization action and put this new city in the south. Pierre started the next round at 4$ but again Mario won the betting round and choose the first build action so he could finish his north-south network. Druing this time Adrien was blocked in the southern area and things didn't look good for him for the the next phase of this scenario. Pierre also had a tough time when there was no goods left for him for shipping. On turn 5 we had to change the setup pf the maps for the second phase of the game and we added the upper part of the map and placed the new city we used in the upper part of the map. To begin this stage Mario and Martin had a big lead and this gave them a big push to begin this round when they could choose the best spot for building and then have nice shippings. Most of the players took 3 or 4 shares to have the best chance to place tracks in the heaven area. Finally Martin won this important bet and choose the first build action as expected. Nathalie began this stage nicely when she shipped 2 goods for 5 income each but Adrien took the 2 other goods that could have gave her the win. Without these goods , she had no chance to win since there was no goods left for her. Martin was able to ship goods in each of the final rounds and he won the game.

We had a very tough time and we'll have to play this map again to fully understand the mechanics of this map. Some players had doubts about the theme but as I said earlier it was soon forgot when we began to play and most of the people were ready to try it again. I'm not sure if 5 players was too much for this map but it was still a good experience and next time we'll try it with 4 players. Martin and Mario were the 2 players that seemed to understand the importance of having a good placement of track for the second stage of the game and it paid them well. As in most Age of Steam games you'll have to think ahead to have success on this map.

Final scoring:
Martin: 64
Mario: 55
Pierre: 50
Nathalie: 44
Adrien: 19

Thread: Age of Steam Disco Inferno session report

dedefortin — 2007-03-29T03:08:02+00:00

It's always fun when we try a new Age of Steam expansion. The Disco Inferno map is having many new mechanisms and the rules weren't too difficult to understand. The main new rule is that some cities are removed when there is no more good in this city. There is also the delivery rule that allow players to move more than 1 good in a single delivery as long as it follows a chain of cities. The map seemed to be able too support the 6 players that would play tonight.

Mario started the bet of round 1 with and Pierre and Laurence betted higher. So Laurence had the initiative and she urbanized a city in the middle of the map so it attracted 3 other players and there was a big congestion in this area. Martin was almost encircled but we know him and he would surely find a way out of this situation as he usually does. Marc-Andre and Nathalie went for the sides of the map where they could control their game more easily. Laurence started the bets at 4 in round 2 but the loco action was choosen by the 4th player only The same situation happened in the next round when the loco action went in third place, it shows that the game was very critical for many players and first build and first move were more important at this stage. On round 3 some cities were already removed as they had no more goods on them so it explain why first move action was becoming important. Bets in round 4 went high as most players betted twice and Marc-Andre was left with 5th place with his turn order. Laurence won the bets at 11$ for urbanization and Martin again won the locomotive action. Marc-Andre was developing his network in the east and he deny Nathalie in building in the southeast area. At this stage the game was very tough for everyone as we all had money problems. Laurence was caught in the middle of the map and made amost no income but Martin made a nice urbanization and shipped 2 goods for 5 income each. Marc-Andre and Martin were clearly in the lead and they fought hard in the end. In the end everyone had to give some income to other players to have some nice deliveries. Marc-Andre finnaly won the game as he didn't need to fight early in the game and he used the chain reaction delivery more often than the other players.

Interaction was good in this game as most players were fighting to have the last good of the cities that were almost empty. We'll have to play this scenario again soon as the game should be faster as the players will use the chain reaction more often.

Final scoring:
Marc-André: 75
Martin: 74
Pierre: 64
Nathalie: 57
Mario: 42
Laurence: 9

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Asdnart — 2007-02-22T19:36:20+00:00

Track after a three-player game of Disco Inferno

Thread: Re: Recommended # of Players

clearclaw — 2007-01-27T00:51:13+00:00

Lemur wrote:
I make it a point to track the recommended # of players for all my Age of Steam boards.

I understand that both maps were designed as 4 player maps, but I'll give the same response to the same question you posted for AoS:London/Sun:

There are no official values. The following geeklist is about as close as it gets:

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/15206

Player tastes vary. The things I optimise for at specific player counts reveal more about my preferences in Age of Steam than anything else. Your preferences may be different. Select your own counsel, make up your own mind, it is your decision.

Thread: Recommended # of Players

Lemur — 2007-01-26T20:38:32+00:00

Hello,

I make it a point to track the recommended # of players for all my Age of Steam boards.

I have no listing for either of these maps.

Are there "official" recommended # of players for these maps?

Thanks!

Chris

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toulouse — 2007-01-16T16:02:17+00:00

Soul Train rules sheet

Thread: Re: What do ya'll think of this?

snoozefest — 2007-01-07T16:10:14+00:00

1 play, 4er, ~~Soul Train~~ edit: Disco Inferno.
Changes from basic game:
- Start with 2 shares and $15 cash!
- Building on open terrain costs $3; towns usual cost (we played upgrading to complex coexisting or crossing cost $4 or $5) -- no other terrain on board.
- 4 cubes (dancers) per city (discotheque), 3 on each off-board New City; no cubes on Goods Display, no Goods Growth dice rolls
- Move Goods: can now do a "Chain Reaction" - when a good is delivered to a city, can deliver a good from that city in a chain of deliveries up to a # of links equal to your link level.
- When a discotheque is emptied of dancers, it burns down! Place any tile over the city upside down (or flip the New City tile, if that was used). It still counts as a city/town, but no new goods may be placed there and it accepts no deliveries.
- Production: draw 2 cubes and place both an any city on the board

It's an interesting map, with a few cities off in the corners with limited access. Towns and cities are to be found 3-4 hexes from each other, so you can start making money early. The chain reaction is especially useful in the early game, allowing you to make money more quickly. Even if you don't win the Loco action, for example, you can use your 1st goods move to go up to 2 links, then move 2 cubes between a pair of cities (Chain Reaction) on the very first turn. Of course, there's an interesting penalty -- moving more cubes (with less income per cube moved) empties the discotheques and burns them down, taking away future delivery targets from your rail network! On the other hand, it also removes a city so that you can move a good of that color through it, to another city further away!

The change to Goods Growth is also nice, especially for people who want to minimize randomness in the game: now, only the initial cube distribution and first turn turn order (and Production draws) are random. It should make planning your builds easier. It also adds another consideration when choosing which city to Urbanize with -- you have to look at which cubes are going to be coming out with it!

Finally, Production is now actually useful! You get to put 2 cubes out onto the board immediately! Yes, it's a random draw, but you can almost always find somewhere in your network to place cubes that you can deliver. And not only is it a source of income, but it can also keep a key disco from being burned down!

Most of us achieved profitability somewhat early; I'd like to try it with more players -- MORE PAIN! It was a fun game with lots of new twists, definitely worth a try!

Thread: Re: What do ya'll think of this?

eratos — 2006-11-13T15:00:45+00:00

Actually, the Disco theme in this made it easier for me to get it to the table

We had a blast playing this as a 4-player, though we did have to waive the Singing Penalty rule

I won by 5 points from my Brother-in-Law, who manage to avoid bankruptcy by the narrowest of margins on Turn 2 and provide an excellent comeback - I still don't know quite how he did it.

The chain reactions rule cetainly helps in the early turns, and nicely balances the "destruction of empty discos" rule by giving you more options with your cubes and less options with your destinations - of course the more chain reactions you go for the faster you destroy discos!

Haven't yet played Soul Train - very much looking forward to the opportunity.

Thread: Re: A few rules questions.

texasjdl — 2006-10-21T09:25:25+00:00

Barkam wrote:

1) Can you move souls from an Earth City to another Earth City in Phase 1? (We played it that you cannot)
No. Souls may only move twice; once from hell to earth, and once from earth to heaven.

Barkam wrote:

2) Can you build multiple links in the same turn? (We played that you can)

Yes.

Barkam wrote:

3) What order do players get to place the New Cities in Heaven? (We played that the auction following the flipping of Hell to Heaven determines the player order)

Almost. The order at the time of flipping the map determines the order of city placement. This means that it's actually the auction _before_ flipping that determines the order. So if it's apparent that there will be few enough cubes left in hell so that it will flip, you should keep that in mind with your bid.

Thread: A few rules questions.

Barkam — 2006-10-21T08:02:36+00:00

This pertains to Soul Train
I really like the map so far. Here are some ambiguities that I ran into.

1) Can you move souls from an Earth City to another Earth City in Phase 1? (We played it that you cannot)
2) Can you build multiple links in the same turn? (We played that you can)
3) What order do players get to place the New Cities in Heaven? (We played that the auction following the flipping of Hell to Heaven determines the player order)

I just want to make sure that we are playing the game correctly. Thank you for your time.

John Paul

Thread: Re: What do ya'll think of this?

clearclaw — 2006-09-29T15:07:55+00:00

slowcorner wrote:
The thing that struck me as strange is the lack of Production on BOTH maps...

As might be apparent from the two maps of mine that Ted is publishing, I think that mucking with the production rules in Age of Steam is one of the cheaper (in a deisgn sense) and more attractive options in producing a new map. So many more interesting things can be done so easily instead of a chart with dice. The next obvious options are the delivery rules: change the path of deliveries, the pricing, the rewards, to ability to make deliveries etc etc etc.

Thread: Re: What do ya'll think of this?

Barkam — 2006-08-31T05:52:50+00:00

I completely love the themes, especially Soul Train. As a Christian, I think these are very funny and should go very well in my small group. Just like JC, I am impressed with Ted's new idea for Production. Just reading the rules I am excited to play it!

Thread: Re: What do ya'll think of this?

clearclaw — 2006-08-28T22:09:09+00:00

chaddyboy_2000 wrote:
I thought the expansions looked strange, but pre-ordered them immediately anyways. Ted's last set of maps is pretty good, so I figured these would be as well.

I've played 'em. They are good. I prefer AoS:Soul Train slightly, but that's mostly due to my great envy at not coming up with the new cube movement idea first.

Thread: Re: Pre-ordering info

cymric — 2006-08-28T21:17:00+00:00

The Soul Train map had me thinking of LucasArts' wonderful adventure Grim Fandango---the only adventure I keep on playing because the storyline is so strong. But I digress.

Thread: Pre-ordering info

toulouse — 2006-08-28T20:56:37+00:00

Check out http://games.bezier.com/AOSDI.html for details on how to pre-order this mapset, whether you're attending Essen or not.

Thread: Re: What do ya'll think of this?

chaddyboy_2000 — 2006-08-28T19:21:46+00:00

I thought the expansions looked strange, but pre-ordered them immediately anyways. Ted's last set of maps is pretty good, so I figured these would be as well.

Thread: Re: What do ya'll think of this?

slowcorner — 2006-08-28T18:28:18+00:00

CortexBomb wrote:
I don't care for the theming on either of the maps, and actually expect that the themes will make them much harder to get to the table, but the new ideas on these sound quite fascinating.

Well, I'm certain to be needing opponents if you can make your way across the state. I'm not that crazy about the themes either, but what can you do?

Thread: Re: What do ya'll think of this?

CortexBomb — 2006-08-28T18:01:58+00:00

I don't care for the theming on either of the maps, and actually expect that the themes will make them much harder to get to the table, but the new ideas on these sound quite fascinating.

Thread: Re: What do ya'll think of this?

slowcorner — 2006-08-28T17:57:11+00:00

I also preordered on sight. The thing that struck me as strange is the lack of Production on BOTH maps, and the very linear nature of the Soul Train expansion. Maybe forced linear travel (in this case, South to North) occurs in some of the tighter expansions that I haven't played yet. The chain reaction option in the Disco Inferno map is something I expect to see copied in future expansions (again, unless it's been seen in other maps I haven't played, in which case it's already been copied). Either way, I like it a lot!

Thread: Re: What do ya'll think of this?

facesnorth — 2006-08-28T17:45:57+00:00

For me, it's not the disco theme that doesn't thrill me so much, as the souls travelling to heaven one is a bit much for me in a train game. But it's certainly a unique map nonetheless. And I love the whole foldout thing, especially how the one map uses part of the other!

Ryan

Thread: Re: What do ya'll think of this?

Great Dane — 2006-08-28T17:30:50+00:00

The theme didn't do anything for me, and it hasn't anything to do with me not being gay - none of my gay friends are into disco either.

Thread: Re: What do ya'll think of this?

jtakagi — 2006-08-28T17:26:38+00:00

I still have no idea how the game actually plays, even after having scanned the each product's page, but it looks very unique. I do really like disco, though the disco theme is not really present other than in the names of the cities, as far as I can tell.

But still, I preordered it as soon as I saw it - I can't wait to give it a try. I like that the Age of Steam system can accommodate so many different rules tweaks that we've seen with the plethora of expansions.

EDIT: One thing I thought of, though, is that the ghost train theme seems to be becoming more prevalent. I've never played Hellrails, but it seems like it's about travelling souls. Now there's these two expansions, and also Spectral Rails, another game I'm looking forward to playing.

Thread: What do ya'll think of this?

facesnorth — 2006-08-28T17:02:49+00:00

This is certainly the most unique map anyone has ever made for AoS thus far. The theme is not really in my tastes, but I love that people are thinking of entirely new ways to expand this system. What does everyone think of this?

Ryan

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toulouse — 2006-08-28T15:42:37+00:00

Pre-flip Soul Train

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toulouse — 2006-08-28T15:41:50+00:00

Soul Train immediately after the "flip"

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toulouse — 2006-08-28T15:13:43+00:00

Disco Inferno after two turns