Game: Age of Steam Expansion - 20,000 Rails Under the Sea

Thread: Re: How was it made ?

clearclaw — 2008-08-23T20:21:24+00:00

kenjohns wrote:
Do you mean that YOU made it at home?

He did.

Thread: Re: How was it made ?

kenjohns — 2008-08-23T20:05:38+00:00

This link results in the same site as in BGG Links.

I assumed that it meant that WE could make it at home and got confused!

Do you mean that YOU made it at home?

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skelebone — 2007-08-30T13:23:31+00:00

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skelebone — 2007-08-30T13:23:16+00:00

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skelebone — 2007-08-30T13:22:59+00:00

Thread: 20,000 Rails Under the Sea: A Review for the Connoisseur

CortexBomb — 2007-08-13T16:44:41+00:00

Age of Steam Expansion - 20,000 Rails Under the Sea: A Review for the Connoisseur

==========================================================================
Initial warning: this review, and all of the future reviews I do that are labeled "For the Connoisseur" are going to be reviews of expansions. This review assumes that you have familiarity with the base game prior to reading this, and gives my opinion on the value of the expansion for base game owners.
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20,000 Rails is probably best known for being the first, and to date, last modular map for Age of Steam. The expansion was released in a run of 180 pieces, all of which were sold at the 2006 Spiel fair in Essen. The expansion is currently only available through the secondary market, and generally fetches somewhere in the range of $50-80.

A Basic Summary
20,000 Rails was reputedly designed to accommodate anywhere between 3 and 6 players. The map itself is a series of modular pieces, each containing a cluster of 7 hexes arranged in a roughly circular pattern. During the course of play, players have an opportunity to add to the map by winning the auction, and also by selecting the Urbanization role.

Important Changes

Modular - The first and most obvious change. The board has a built-in starting configuration based on the number of players. From that point on, 1 piece is added to the map at the start of each round (placed by the player who won the auction last round for free) and another can be placed if someone selects Urbanization and pays for the privilege.

Different Colour / Delivery Scheme - Another big change. There are two types of "cities"; those that have goods on them and those that accept goods. The cities that accept goods have a series of 5 squares on them, one of each good colour. Those cities will accept up to 1 of each good colour. When goods are delivered to them, the good is actually placed on the appropriate colour square, and the city no longer accepts that colour. Once all 5 colours have been delivered to the city, they are cleared back off, and the city accepts all 5 again.

Goods Growth Altered - In the early portion of the game, the goods growth scheme is changed so that the cities waiting to be placed on the board have goods on them already, and to guarantee that the cities on the board keep receiving goods.

No Natural Towns - The board starts with no towns on it. Players can opt to turn a hex into a town by choosing the Production role and paying the price. Note that there are no New City tiles in this game, so the towns exist only to increase delivery distance or to branch a network out.

Track Building Limits Lifted - There is no limit to the amount of track that one can build, but each piece of track costs as much as all of the previously built pieces, plus its own cost. Hence, a shallow water piece of track costs $1. A second one would cost $1 plus the $1 for the previously built track that round. A third would cost $1 plus the $2 spent on other track that round, and so on. This sounds innocuous enough, but when more expensive terrain (or town building) is involved, prices go up in a hurry.

Scale
As I mentioned in the introduction, this map is supposed to scale between 3 and 6. I have only played it with 3 though, and I would not want to play it with any more. The reason for this is simple: space. Even with 3 players, and nearly all of the modular tiles placed, there was hardly any room to build track on any given round. Players need to plan ahead for the track building phase by taking things like First Build and Urbanization aggressively, otherwise it is very easy to be locked out of the useful parts of the board.

People who have played it at a higher scale seem to confirm this analysis, as there are several complaints about a lack of space in the personal reviews of this expansion.

How Challenging is this map?
Moderately so. On one hand, the delivery scheme seems to make it fairly easy to set oneself up for maximum length deliveries each round. On the other hand, it is not all that difficult to find oneself locked out of lucrative portions of the board, and with nothing but shoddy deliveries available.

I do think that this map should only be played by the experienced AoS veteran though. The game system is heavily altered in this expansion, and nearly every phase has some sort of change. The track building math can also be a mess, and takes some getting used to. I could not imagine trying to teach this map to people who have played less than 5 or 10 games of AoS.

What do I think of it?
I like this map. It's not one of my all time favourites, but it's currently in the upper 1/3 or so of maps that I've played. I am a sucker for novelty though, and this map rates highly in that category. I'm also a sucker for maps that scale down to 3, and as I've said, this map seems to do that decently as well.

The map does have limitations related to that scale though, the auction is just full of fantastic and useful abilities. I think bidding high is still useful because it allows the winner to place a new section of the board for free before the next round, but I do believe that the auction is the main weakness of the map.

Should I buy it?
I think this is a map that is best played before purchased. It has been a divisive release, and many people like the idea of the map more than the implementation. The other factor involved there is the price, this map was already fetching $50+ shortly after its release, and unless it is re-released (doubtful given the amount of hand work that the designer went through for the first 180) it will not be getting any cheaper in the future.

All of that said, if you find a reasonably priced copy, and you have a consistent group of 3, then this is worth giving a whirl. I think it works pretty well at that scale, and there is nothing else quite like it.

My Final Slant: Solid, innovative map. Best played only with 3. Probably too expensive for what you get based on current secondary market prices.

Note: Though I am now associated with AoS Team, the group that put out this map, this review was written prior to that.

Thread: Age of Steam 20000 rails under the sea session report

dedefortin — 2007-06-24T02:20:11+00:00

We had another new map to try tonight with the 20000 rails under the sea map. This expansion is quite different from all the other map since this is a modular map. Many actions have been modified and we needed more time than usual to clarify some rules. We finally began the game with 2 players. We know this map isn't supposed to be played with this number of player but since we discover the 2 players rules from the Austria map from John Bohrer we had great game with this system. Even if we didn't know what could be the result, at least it would be easier to explain the rules when we'll play this map later with 3, 4 or 5 players.

On turn 1, Pierre made a big mistake as he took the Production action to add a link but since there was no links already built, he couldn't use his action. Martin took the always usefull loco action to begin. On the next turn Pierre did almost the same trick as in round 1 when he took the engineer action to build on the sand to connect an important city where Martin had started the game. As Martin took the first build action he was able to block Pierre and deny him in connecting his own territory. Martin then added a new tile to begin his turn and Pierre again took the production action. In the next turn Martin again added a tile and was able to place it so Pierre would have a hard time reaching the new city on this tile. Martin seemed to understand the value of the tile placement very fast. They are very important as a source of good or at the end of your network to ship goods. Pierre's position was so bad that he had to take the first build action several times because he was afraid that he couldn't connect the new tiles placed by Martin. At this stage Martin had a great lead but we decided to continue as we were able to discover the new actions and develop some strategies.

As I said earlier we knew that 2 players on this expansion wasn't the best number but we had a good experience. We had fun and I think we were able to learn this map well. We have to play this map again for sure to see the full potential but there was many original concepts. The quality of the map was average since there was no protection on the tiles. So, we had to add a cardboard and laminate the tiles to protect them. As there are many new actions or some actions modified Martin S. made a great work in doing a new good display for this expansion. I'm sure it will be very usefull since the maps already requires lot of concentration.

Final score:
Martin: 108
Pierre: 69

Thread: Harry Harrison

bcarstensen11 — 2007-05-05T12:39:46+00:00

Sort of like "A TransAtlantic Tunnel, Hurrah!", I think...

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jcurtis55 — 2007-05-05T03:10:46+00:00

Final board position for jcurtis session report

Thread: 20000 Rails - 3 players

jcurtis55 — 2007-05-05T02:02:19+00:00

We played a 3-player game last night. I had picked up 20,000 Rails Under the Sea when Fun Again obtained a few copies to sell after Essen. Comments I had read said this expansion was best with 3 players so we put off playing until we had an evening with three AoS players. That night finally arrived.

I knew there was a rules thread on BGG with some important clarifications in it, but wouldn’t you know when I tried to go to BGG to print the thread, there was a server problem and BGG was not available. It had been quite some time since I had read the thread and I could not remember the details, so we just read through the rules and followed them the best we could. This meant we played that production was required to place any kind of complex tile. The end result was we did not play many complex tiles and those were not until near the end of the game. We did not place any gray town disks at all! The odd thing is, the game worked well this way and you really had to work to set up long runs. But first, let’s recap the rules differences for 20,000 Rails.

Tiles – As you surely know, 2RUTS has a modular map. There are a couple of ways new tiles are added to the board. The high bidder in the auction gets to place a free tile at the start of the next turn. Next, the urbanization action allows you to place a tile before you build track, but costs you $3. There are two types of tiles. There are cities that can receive goods and there are sea beds that produce goods. Each tile consists of 7 hexes with the city or sea bed in the center. The city tile had a city surrounded by three sea hexes and 3 sand hexes. The sea beds are surrounded by sea hexes and deep sea hexes. The deep sea hexes and sand hexes have a base cost of $2 to build on them. More later on the cost of laying track.

Engineer – The engineer role is required to lay track on a sand hex.

Urbanization – Add a tile to the board for $3

Production – The correct rule is the person with production can add a gray disk, and only one gray disk to any line, thereby adding a link. This could be used offensively or defensively. You can obviously add links to your own deliveries and boost your income. You could also add a link and prevent an opponent from delivering a good if their locomotive is not big enough. The English translation of the rules state production is required to lay any complex tile, but that has been clarified by the designer on the BGG forums.

Move first, build first, locomotive and turn order work as normal.

Build track – This is quite a departure from the standard AoS rules. The 2RUTS rules do not limit you on how many track tiles you can lay, but the cost mechanism realistically limits you to two or three tiles, and two is definitely the norm. Here’s why; when you place your first tile you pay the normal cost for the terrain, which is $1 or $2 unless you are playing a complex hex, where you add the normal costs to the terrain cost. Now, when you lay your 2nd tile, you pay the cost of the first tile again, plus the cost for the 2nd hex. So, laying track on two normal $1 sea hexes will cost you $3. $1 for the first, plus $1 + $1 for the 2nd. If you build on a normal sea hex and then a deep sea hex it will cost you $4 ($1 + 1$ + $2.). Now here is another interesting twist. If I am connecting a sea bed to a city or another sea bed, the rule say I have to lay the first track next to the sea bed or city that already has a track connected to it. So, say I’ve place a new map board tile this turn and now I’m building track. I will be building track on a normal sea hex and a deep sea hex. Since I have to re-pay for the first track tile when I play the 2nd track tile, I’ll want to build in the normal sea hex first ($1) if I can. However, if the normal sea hex is next to the sea bed I just added to the board, I cannot build in that hex first but must add the first track tile adjacent to the city or sea bed already connected to the network. This means I have to place track on the deep sea hex first. Now my cost for the two track pieces becomes $2 + $2 + $1, so I will pay an extra $1 by starting with the $2 hex first. As you can see, placing a third track tile gets pretty darn expensive as you have to repay the cost of the 2nd track piece to place the third. We may have only had one or two times when someone actually placed 4 track tiles and that was near the end of the game when cash was more plentiful.

Shipping goods – Each city has 5 boxes, one for each color of goods. When a good is shipped from a sea bed to a city, the good cube is placed on the box of the color the shipped cube, and that city cannot receive that color of cube again until the boxes in the city are cleared. The boxes in the city are cleared immediately when all five boxes are filled. This added some really interesting strategies. A player may have to take a short 1 or 2 delivery to put the first red cube in a city, for example. Once that red box is full, you can ship red cubes through that city to another destination, allowing you to do a longer run. For this reason, we seemed to favor sea beds that had multiple cubes of the same color, especially if you were the only player with track connected to that sea bed. You might have to take a short run to deliver the first good of a color, but that may set you up for a much longer run to deliver the 2nd or 3rd cube of the same color. Of course, if multiple players have connections to the sea bed then move order and the connections each player has in his or her network makes for some interesting and agonizing decisions. For this reason, it seems the photos I have seen of the finished boards for the game often have long extended peninsulas as players try to build an area they can monopolize.

Goods production – There are 12 sea bed map tiles. Six with white 1-6 and six with a black 1-6. You do not roll for goods production. On the first four turns, the cubes on top row in the goods area are automatically placed on their corresponding sea bed, even if that map tile has not been added to the board. If a sea bed is connected to a track for all three players then it will receive 2 cubes. I believe if you had more players and a sea bed is connected to 5 or 6 players it will receive 3 cubes. You then move all the cubes up the chart and fill in any empty spots. This occurs for the first four turns and then the normal goods growth kicks in. So from turn 5 one you roll the dice as normal and we played a sea bed only got a cube if the map tile had been added to the board. There is no production to add more cubes to the chart. What this means is, the sea bed map tiles you add to the board come pre-loaded with some number of cubes. Looking at the cubes on a map tile and what cubes will soon be added gives you plenty to think about when selecting a tile to add to the board.

Our game: Eric, myself and his daughter Lena set up the three-player map, went through the rules quickly and jumped in. We were all experienced Age of Steam players. This would be a tough one to play for your first AoS experience. Let me just say that if you build third on turn one, you better have urbanization for your action or issue a lot of stock. You are at the mercy of the first two players as to how you can connect the one sea bed to the two starting cities. If at least one of the first two builders is willing to lay 3 rail tiles, they can make you need 3 or 4 tiles with a crossover to connect the starting sea bed to one of the cities. In our game Eric was the third builder, but he did have urbanization and he dropped in a city map tile on the south side of the starting sea bed. This is just one example of where this game offers some opportunities to really make it costly for others to lay tile. Since the board tends to expand with somewhat narrow corridors, nasty plays to cut off others are certainly possible. This is where having the opportunity to add a map piece to the board can be critical. We had a couple of occasions where the auction winner took urbanization and got to place two consecutive map pieces. Lena made good use of this to create her own personal extension to the map, kind of like the private gated peninsula former President Bush owns in Kenneckbunkport Maine. On turn two, I took Engineer and built a $6 link through the sand connecting the two starting cities. I knew I was taking a risk. I was player 2, but if someone took first move I could be left with no cubes instead of using the new two link route I had set up. Eric had third choice of the actions. Locomotive was not taken and I had high hopes, but after some thought he took first move and I had a turn where I had issued 2 shares, built some expensive track, and then did not increase my income at all. I went ahead and increased my locomotive size to further increase my deficit spending. This put me in a hole for the rest of the game. I did not write down the turns, but Lena became profitable earlier than Eric or me. I believe she turned a profit from turn 4 on. Eric took a turn longer and it took me three turns more to turn a profit.

As the map developed Lena aggressively guarded her turf by building 2nd connections from the central cites to the first sea bed on her peninsula to totally block any chance Eric or I had of tapping into her hoarded cubes. The rules do not allow you to place a new map piece in such a way that an enclosed hole is left in the map, and the layout made it difficult to add to her area of the map while connecting into our existing track networks.

Since Eric and my networks were intertwined, it was difficult to add to the map without also benefiting the other. The preferred addition was definitely the sea bed map pieces as then put more cubes on the map and allowed you to also add a link for a longer run. With only 3 players, AoS allows everyone to get a good action every turn. First move and first build can both be critical. With urbanization costing $3, it was not always taken. You could bid that $3, which was often enough to win the auction, and get first play as well as the opportunity to place a map tile. There is a benefit to urbanization though, as you not only get to add a map piece to the board, but you get first choice of building on the new piece. This means you could often build on two $1 hexes and leave the more expensive hexes for the others.

Even with everyone getting a good action, it seemed like there were several times I wanted to take first move or first build, but needed to build through sand so I had to take engineer and hope the hexes and cubes I wanted would be there when the time came.

As the game entered the last three turns, Eric got his locomotive to 6, while Lena and I was still at 4. Her section of the map was pretty much limiting her to 4 runs, and Eric took advantage of this to overcome Lena on the last turn. Actually, we didn’t know it until we added everything up, but Eric also had the most track, and may have had the lead after the next-to-last turn. It did not hurt his cause that I mistakenly made a couple of cube deliveries that used one of his track sections.

The final tallies looked like this:

Eric – 12 shares issued, income 30, track 23 for a total score of 77
Lena – 8 shares issued, income 25, track 18 for a score of 69
Jeff – 14 shares issued, income 25, track 21 for a score of 54

Lena’s early rise to profitability allowed her to issue the fewest shares by far and darn near won her the game. Meanwhile my early big deficit and expensive track laying had me issuing share in all but the last turn or two. Age of steam is a brain-burner of a game and 20,0000 Rails Under the Sea turned the incinerator up a few more degrees. When we play again and use the correct production rules and actually place gray disks to add links to the rail lines, I think the strategy possibilities will go up even more. Still, we had a lot of fun even playing it the way we did. Not placing the gray disks made it much more of a challenge to get runs of four or more income. I assume in the next game our final scores would rise as it would be considerably easier to add links to your runs, and would make locomotive all the more valuable.

I will be adding an image of the final board for this game, so look for that assuming it gets approved.

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Verkisto — 2007-03-11T08:03:33+00:00

End of a 3-player game, the winner being green.

Thread: Re: Production Rule

clearclaw — 2007-02-12T20:45:58+00:00

Verkisto wrote:
This sounds like something that happened to me on your Sun map....

Yep! That's the primary control on Locomotive not being the insta-win-wonderful action on that map. Locomotive goes first, and then all the other players ensure they can't deliver for crap.

Happily for AoS:20 000 rails under the Sea, the Production action isn't quite as powerful -- you can only build one town. Without that limit the Production player in this map can simply abuse the other players into zero-delivery debt-spiral submission.

Thread: Re: Production Rule

Verkisto — 2007-02-12T20:25:51+00:00

clearclaw wrote:
In which case the Production action is an immensely powerful action. With it a player can control the route lengths for other players, thereby retaining delivery options for themselves while preventing them from being able to efficiently deliver in the mid-game. How? They simply construct towns in their opponent's track until their delivery Links are too long.

This sounds like something that happened to me on your Sun map....

Thread: Re: Incredible price !

craniac — 2007-01-15T19:49:25+00:00

The page showing the home production is great! Here is an english translation via babelfish:

http://babelfish.altavista.com/babelfish/trurl_pagecontent?l...

JC Clearclaw: I would love links and brand names for the dies you recommend, thanks!

Thread: Re: Production Rule

clearclaw — 2006-12-03T21:04:05+00:00

Ludo le gars wrote:
Only one upgraded tile by a turn. Sorry but it isn't written in english even if it is in french : "Une seule ramification par tour est autorisée".

That makes a huge difference, enourmous, and prevents the sort of abusive town creation I referred to. Typically here I've been getting Production in turn 3 (by which time I have 4 Links) and creating 2 to 4 towns in other player's track in order to protect my cubes. The towns are created specifically so that no other player can run for more than 3 or 4 income in the whole turn. I then run for 8 income and set myself up for the same pattern in subsequent turns. Typically with this approach I'll have driven at least one of the other players and sometimes two of them into the bankruptcy death spiral by turn 5, all while safely securing my position for the win.

FWLIW the exact same abusive pattern is not only possible with AoS:Sun, but a core part of play. However on that map it is critically restricted by the fact that players may build only a single route/path, a single "line" of contiguous tiles on each turn. That small change makes all the difference in the world, err, sun.

Thread: Re: Production Rule

Ludo le gars — 2006-12-03T20:26:32+00:00

clearclaw wrote:
They simply construct towns in their opponent's track until their delivery Links are too long.

Mhhh. Not very easy to get this action each turn, I'm sure you'll need another one (Locomotive or First build for example).

Michael : Only one upgraded tile by a turn. Sorry but it isn't written in english even if it is in french : "Une seule ramification par tour est autorisée".

Hope it is clear,

Have fun,

Ludo

Thread: Re: Production Rule

clearclaw — 2006-12-03T05:02:25+00:00

CortexBomb wrote:
Can one buy multiple town markers with only one Production action?

Good question. The offensive use of town creation is a core technique in my own AoS:Sun map.

Thread: Re: Production Rule

CortexBomb — 2006-12-03T04:31:27+00:00

Can one buy multiple town markers with only one Production action?

i.e.: If I take production, can I upgrade 2 hexes that round into towns?

Thread: Re: Production Rule

clearclaw — 2006-12-02T05:38:33+00:00

Ludo le gars wrote:
Tiles with complex tracks can be put by everybody. Tiles with grey marker can only be put by PRODUCTION action.

In which case the Production action is an immensely powerful action. With it a player can control the route lengths for other players, thereby retaining delivery options for themselves while preventing them from being able to efficiently deliver in the mid-game. How? They simply construct towns in their opponent's track until their delivery Links are too long.

Thread: Re: Production Rule

Ludo le gars — 2006-11-16T18:34:58+00:00

ntrolls wrote:
The last one, I promise! What is the cost of upgrading to a complex tile when you're building? Is it the same to the normal tile?
No change with the original rule. Of course, you have to add the previous cost to the new one.

Best

Thread: Re: Production Rule

ntrolls — 2006-11-16T01:16:20+00:00

The last one, I promise! What is the cost of upgrading to a complex tile when you're building? Is it the same to the normal tile?

Thread: Re: Production Rule

Ludo le gars — 2006-11-15T17:13:54+00:00

ntrolls wrote:
That is clear, except for one point. Please clarify whether the following paragraph is correct.

"The track building rule says you can only use the complex tiles by upgrading. So even if everyone can use the complex tiles, you still have to upgrade a normal tile to a complex one, and you cannot just build one right away. This upgrade process has nothing to do with the production tile."

Correct.

Sorry if the english rule is ambiguous.

Best

Thread: Re: Production Rule

ntrolls — 2006-11-15T13:25:10+00:00

That is clear, except for one point. Please clarify whether the following paragraph is correct.

"The track building rule says you can only use the complex tiles by upgrading. So even if everyone can use the complex tiles, you still have to upgrade a normal tile to a complex one, and you cannot just build one right away. This upgrade process has nothing to do with the production tile."

If that is correct, then the english rule about production action is quite misleading because it says "complex tile" instead of "a tile with a town". And the french rule translated by Google was actually correct, because it's just about adding a town, and has nothing to do with the complex tiles.

Thank you for your patience

Thread: Re: Production Rule

Ludo le gars — 2006-11-15T11:55:25+00:00

Hi,

Tiles with complex tracks can be put by everybody.
Tiles with grey marker can only be put by PRODUCTION action.

Is it clear ?

Thread: Re: Production Rule

ntrolls — 2006-11-15T11:13:11+00:00

While my french is virtually nonexistent, the google language tools seem to do the job. The production section of the original french rule says:

une tuile avec un jeton gris(réel ou symbolisé).

which translates to

a tile with a gray token (real or symbolized)

I think the confusion lies in the fact that, in the english rules, the "town disc" is inside the parenthesis. However it seems like the french rule clearly says that the new tile should have a town symbol, with "(drawn or wooden disc)". Which makes quite a difference.

Combining this with the answers in this thread and the track building rules, I would interpret that the action means both upgrading and adding a town at the same time, which are tightly coupled. You can only use the complex tiles using the production action; you upgrade if and only if you add a town.

It sounds a bit restricted, I agree. I think it would sound more natural if it allowed some flexibility, e.g., just adding a town marker(without "upgrading" to a complex tile), or just allowing you to "build"(not upgrade) a complex tile.

Thread: Re: Production Rule

clearclaw — 2006-11-15T07:02:36+00:00

ntrolls wrote:
Okay, now I see! So you can only use the complex tiles by choosing the production action and doing the upgrade. However, whenever you upgrade a normal tile to a complex one, it gets a town disc, thereby increasing the link.

Given that the English rules were not written by a fluent English speaker, I don't think the English rules are clear that EVERY tile upgrade must become a town. I know they say that upgrades CAN become towns but must they ALWAYS? Also, can the acting player upgrade as many tiles as they wish assuming they can afford to?

I'm curious about this due to a rather disappointing experience with last night's game. I bounced between Urbanisation to get the deliveries I wanted, and then Production to inject towns in other player's track to increase their delivery lengths so that they were unable to make the deliveries they'd wanted (thus protecting the cubes for me). They couldn't return the favour to me due to track spacing and killing their own delivery chances. Four turns of that and they were so far in debt when I went profitable that we simply called the game.

I remain concerned that the actions are too exclusively useful: Engineer is only useful for building sand, Urbanisation to add cube sources and destinations, Production for controlling Link length via track upgrades and town insertion. Having so many rich actions available dilutes the value of the auction. I'll post some questions and thoughts later after a further play.

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ahazperutz — 2006-11-15T05:07:10+00:00

Thread: Re: Production Rule

ntrolls — 2006-11-14T23:43:31+00:00

Okay, now I see! So you can only use the complex tiles by choosing the production action and doing the upgrade. However, whenever you upgrade a normal tile to a complex one, it gets a town disc, thereby increasing the link.

Thank you for the clarification!

Thread: Re: Production Rule

Ludo le gars — 2006-11-14T22:38:40+00:00

Hello,

I try to answer you clearly.

First, the englsih rule :
PRODUCTION – This rule replaces the standard rule. If you select this action then you can upgrade any track tile with a complex tile (with a real or drawn grey town disc). This costs $3 plus any costs accruing from previously built track tiles. All existing links must remain unaltered. The players should place control discs on each new complete or incomplete link created.

It means that the only way to upgrade a tile into a complex tile (with a grey disk, real or drawn) is to take the PRODUCTION action. The cost is 3$ for this hex + the previous costs. For example, if you've built 2 hexes in normal sea + one upgraded tile, it will cost : 1 + (1+1) + (2+3) = 8$.

Is it better ? I do my best to speak a correct english but, in fact, it is still a poor one ;-)

Enjoy,

Thread: Re: Production Rule

locusshifter — 2006-11-14T22:30:46+00:00

Clearclaw has the rules right.

The only way to get new towns to deliver to out on the board is to either win the auction (and you get to play a new tile out on the board with a town or production area), or choose the urbanization action.

Otherwise the whole board won't grow at all.

Thread: Re: Production Rule

clearclaw — 2006-11-14T22:02:38+00:00

ntrolls wrote:
If I am not mistaken, you can add a link by replacing one of the track tile by choosing the production action; and this is the only way of having the "towns" on the board. In other words, the purpose of this action is only introducing the "towns" in order to increase the links.

Am I correct?

My reading is that:

a) The only player that can upgrade track is the Production player

b) All track upgrades cost $3/tile plus the standard previous tile cost.

c) Simple track can be upgraded to a 3-exit town or a 4-exit town (ie complex tile). It isn't clear if simple track can be upgraded to a complex tile (crossing or co-existing) without also making it a town. Additionally the upgrade cost of adding an exit to a 3-exit town isn't covered, or of redirecting an exit on a town.

Thread: Production Rule

ntrolls — 2006-11-14T21:31:09+00:00

If I am not mistaken, you can add a link by replacing one of the track tile by choosing the production action; and this is the only way of having the "towns" on the board. In other words, the purpose of this action is only introducing the "towns" in order to increase the links.

Am I correct?

Thread: Re: Incredible price !

clearclaw — 2006-11-06T17:51:04+00:00

Ludo le gars wrote:
As it was said, it was a crazy amount of work to produce this modular map (a link here : http://lgimet.over-blog.com/article-4211299.html ).
So 180 ex. was the real maximum to sell.

If you do something like this again, get a die to cut the tiles. Cost should be around US$120. This will enable you to cut the tiles from each sheet in a single operation. No more laborious hand-cut tiles! The only requirement is that the registration of the images on each sheet be accurate. With that setup cutting all the tiles for all 180 games would have taken but a few hours.

The solution : producing the map with a game company... Much more maps and not home-made maps anymore ! Which one ?

I've been very pleased with Bezier games and their handling of Age of Steam Expansion - Sun / London.

Thread: Re: Incredible price !

kvn299 — 2006-11-06T17:42:05+00:00

As it was said, it was a crazy amount of work to produce this modular map

I've made game components and I can imagine that this was quite a lot of work. 15 Euros is definitely a good price for something that took so much effort.

I'm sure if you decide to make this expansion available through other means, you'll find many folks who will be eager to buy it, myself included.

Thread: Re: Incredible price !

Ludo le gars — 2006-11-06T16:43:15+00:00

Hi,

As it was said, it was a crazy amount of work to produce this modular map (a link here : http://lgimet.over-blog.com/article-4211299.html ).
So 180 ex. was the real maximum to sell.

But, when I say the price is incredible, it's just to mention that it is surprising me a lot. Not more. And if people want to pay 200€ for one set it's his own problem.

The solution : producing the map with a game company... Much more maps and not home-made maps anymore !
Which one ?

Best

Thread: Re: Incredible price !

kvn299 — 2006-11-06T16:17:08+00:00

djflippy wrote:
kvn299 wrote:

Second, I think it's a bit disingenuous to release a very limited run expansion to an extremely popular game at a single venue, then proclaim how upset you are that people are scalping it. It suggests that you don't understand the market for which you are creating products.

C'mon guys...this same seller is trying to sell a copy of Through the Ages for 500 Euros (!!!) and you think the designer is disingenuous?!? Of course the designer is surprised, because that is way overpriced.

If you're going to use my words against me, at least do me the favor and not take them out of context. The comment you quoted was prefaced by this:

kvn299 wrote:
First off, just to clear things up, this hasn't been sold for 199 Euros... it's only posted "for sale" at that price. This seller frequently posts rare/high demand items for extremely high prices. I have no idea whether this has been a successful strategy.

And I still stand by the entire statement. I AM aware that this seller has crazy prices. The maps may never sell at this point, but I can guarantee they won't ever sell for 15 Euros, or even close to that amount. For the designer to believe otherwise is naive.

Thread: Re: Incredible price !

djflippy — 2006-11-06T16:03:30+00:00

Slobodon Ginfizz wrote:
I don't understand. You announced a limited edition, knowingly creating a scarcity of supply, and now you seem unhappy when this caused the perceived value to skyrocket. What else could have happened? People being what they are, it's almost certain that some of the original purchasers bought copies with the sole intent of selling them at inflated prices to people who actually wanted them.

kvn299 wrote:

Second, I think it's a bit disingenuous to release a very limited run expansion to an extremely popular game at a single venue, then proclaim how upset you are that people are scalping it. It suggests that you don't understand the market for which you are creating products.

C'mon guys...this same seller is trying to sell a copy of Through the Ages for 500 Euros (!!!) and you think the designer is disingenuous?!? Of course the designer is surprised, because that is way overpriced.

There are a lot of reasons to produce small print runs and in no way do I think this designer did it so that people would sell it for 200 Euros. Personally, I think he was posting this here to warn people not to buy it for such an inflated price. Geez, give a guy a break.

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geekstore.php3?action=viewitem&...

Thread: Re: Incredible price !

qzhdad — 2006-11-06T15:31:58+00:00

Being a non-Essen goer (so far, at least), I paid $75 in a large deal including Die Macher for the Moon/Reunion map and felt pretty good about it. I've made sure to pre-order the Bezier maps ($25 for 2) and think that's a fair price for all concerned. I second the recommendation(s) above to contact Bezier and/or Winsome to see if there is interest or doing the pdf option. There is at least one 18XX game that handled it using the pdf approach.

Thread: Re: Incredible price !

deacondavid — 2006-11-06T15:24:09+00:00

CortexBomb wrote:
My suggestion to Ludo: if you want to drop the price, but avoid making more maps, then you should simply sell the PDF files required to make this map. Charge 5 or 10 Euros for the download so that people feel they are paying a fair price, and just let people make their own that way. This would preserve the value of the original, nicer quality run, but would satiate demand and drop the ridiculous secondary prices of this expansion. I would suggest a similar measure for the Moon / Reunion Island map pair from Essen 2005 as well, which has also commanded extremely high prices on the secondary market since its release.

Excellent suggestion! I wish that Winsome would do this, too.

Warfrog are no longer doing Age of Steam expansions. This means that the Essen-only AoS maps are likely to never be seen, much less played or owned for the overwhelming majority of AoS players. Someone had a copy of the Moon/Reunion map in last year's BGG.Con flea market for over $100, which is way too much, in my opinion.

Thread: Re: Incredible price !

CortexBomb — 2006-11-06T15:09:52+00:00

In defence of Ludo here, if you actually look at the amount of work that he had to go to to produce the 20,000 Rails expansion then you would probably have more sympathy for the number produced...if I was making something that took that much work I wouldn't have released 180 of them...more like 50, and I would have charged twice as much for the amount of effort involved!

But, in defence of the other posters here, Age of Steam is a very popular game. It has a very large following on the Geek, and any expansion is going to create a huge amount of interest here. When the number of maps produced is less than even the number of BGG users who would want to buy it, then the price is obviously going to end up inflated, and rather quickly at that!

My suggestion to Ludo: if you want to drop the price, but avoid making more maps, then you should simply sell the PDF files required to make this map. Charge 5 or 10 Euros for the download so that people feel they are paying a fair price, and just let people make their own that way. This would preserve the value of the original, nicer quality run, but would satiate demand and drop the ridiculous secondary prices of this expansion. I would suggest a similar measure for the Moon / Reunion Island map pair from Essen 2005 as well, which has also commanded extremely high prices on the secondary market since its release.

Thread: Re: Incredible price !

kvn299 — 2006-11-06T14:45:44+00:00

First off, just to clear things up, this hasn't been sold for 199 Euros... it's only posted "for sale" at that price. This seller frequently posts rare/high demand items for extremely high prices. I have no idea whether this has been a successful strategy.

Second, I think it's a bit disingenuous to release a very limited run expansion to an extremely popular game at a single venue, then proclaim how upset you are that people are scalping it. It suggests that you don't understand the market for which you are creating products.

Thread: Re: Incredible price !

HDTVDave — 2006-11-06T14:08:13+00:00

Yes. Please print more.

I'd like one, but I shudder to think what I will have to pay if I can find one at all. This is a free market at work. I have no problem at all with the person who sold one for 199 euros. If he found someone willing to pay that, then that is what it is worth. It just isn't worth that to me.

Things would work better if arbitrage('scalping') didn't take place. (The practice you are bringing up is called scalping here in the US.) However, if the market gets to a situation that supports it, scalping is going to happen. A better situation is to not create the desire for scalping-
-Charge more when the item is initially sold. This way demand will be lower, and the original artist/producer will keep more of the economic reward for the work. Honestly, 15 euros sounded remarkably low.
-Print more (or make it known that if demand exists, you will print more). This keeps a lid on the scalped prices. Ted Alspach (toulouse here on BGG) is printing several maps. There are other publishers of small quantities of games. (I'm not associated with any of them, but if you can't find any, I'll get you a list of several, just in hopes that you will work something out and make it less expensive for me to get one of these.)
-Have a wider distribution path. These could ONLY be acquired in Essen. If there had been other points of distribution, scalping would not have been nearly as effective. (i.e. have a way to get it shipped directly, or even ship a bunch to someone in the US with the understanding that they will sell them somewhere somehow. Even if you could only ship at unreasonably high shipping charges, that would have helped keep a lid on the scalped prices.)

BTW, if you find these comments useful, I would take one of the 20 000 rails games as a reward. I can send you my shipping address (or even one in France).

Dave

Thread: Re: Incredible price !

Slobodon Ginfizz — 2006-11-06T13:37:44+00:00

I don't understand. You announced a limited edition, knowingly creating a scarcity of supply, and now you seem unhappy when this caused the perceived value to skyrocket. What else could have happened? People being what they are, it's almost certain that some of the original purchasers bought copies with the sole intent of selling them at inflated prices to people who actually wanted them.

Thread: Re: Incredible price !

qzhdad — 2006-11-06T12:18:05+00:00

I suggest printing some more around the initial price) available for mail order.
(And count me as an eager customer.)

Thread: Incredible price !

Ludo le gars — 2006-11-06T11:25:45+00:00

Hi,

I'm the french designer of this expansion map and I can't believe my eyes when I see how much my expansion is sold just after Essen : 199€ !!!
Here : http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geekstore.php3?action=viewitem&...

In fact, just to remember, it was only 15€ in Essen, so even if it is a 180 limited pieces, I can't be really OK with a so high price...

Image

cray — 2006-10-29T21:49:47+00:00

3 player game end. Green: 99, Yellow: 73, Red: 42

Thread: Re: How was it made ?

slowcorner — 2006-10-29T12:47:51+00:00

Wow! That's an impressive amount of work. Did the expansion sell out?

Thread: How was it made ?

Ludo le gars — 2006-10-29T10:49:30+00:00

Hi,

I'm the french designer of this expansion. Just have a look at this link to see how it was home-made !
http://lgimet.over-blog.com/article-4211299.html

Hope you'll have fun with this modular expansion !

Thread: Re: Interesting, but...

slowcorner — 2006-09-28T11:26:46+00:00

Thanks for the response. Believe me, I was not counting on a lucky AoS map!

Thread: Re: Interesting, but...

Ludo le gars — 2006-09-28T10:59:00+00:00

slowcorner wrote:
...how does it work? I'd like a bit more info before I pre-order this. Are there rules for placing the tiles? Are the tiles constructed so cities are always a set distance apart, or do certain balancing rules get invoked if cities are x hexes from each other?

Hi !

Thanks for your interest.
The rule about tiles placement is : the previous first player adds a new map tile connected to any one ever placed. but are you going to make an advantage for you or not ? You're not sure to be the next first player...
About cubes, you can predict which ones will appear until the 4th turn, so you are really sure what you have to try.
No much lucky map.

sorry for my poor english...

Thread: Re: Interesting, but...

clearclaw — 2006-09-27T22:00:22+00:00

slowcorner wrote:
ixnay66 wrote:
I'm going to wait until the Alice In Wonderland and Wizard of Oz AoS expansions come out.

As a future owner of the Sun, and 1970's boogaloo expansions, I wholeheartedly agree.

And there are more coming! I hope you enjoy your maps.

Where's the ogres? More importantly, where's my Ogre Smasher upgrade for my loco! To hell with cow catchers!

I'm still toying with a King and King's Progress mechanism for a future map. Maybe not ogres, but tyrants semi-count don't they? It didn't quite work on London and so was removed in development. Meanwhile the map I'm currently working on attempts to raise the screwage bar by several steps.

Actually, I'd just be happy to get hold of expansion #1 for under $70.

There are still a few copies at British game stores in the back woods at RRP.

Thread: Re: Interesting, but...

CortexBomb — 2006-09-27T18:44:22+00:00

Well, if you really need a fix feel free to visit West Michigan...you could play AoS pretty much any saturday night if you came over here...

And for the record, I think these Essen-only maps should be likened to Moby Dick more than anything...hard to track, and if you find them your wallet will probably end up fatally wounded

Thread: Re: Interesting, but...

slowcorner — 2006-09-27T18:38:13+00:00

ixnay66 wrote:
I'm going to wait until the Alice In Wonderland and Wizard of Oz AoS expansions come out.

As a future owner of the Sun, and 1970's boogaloo expansions, I wholeheartedly agree. Where's the ogres? More importantly, where's my Ogre Smasher upgrade for my loco! To hell with cow catchers!

Actually, I'd just be happy to get hold of expansion #1 for under $70.

Even more actually, I'd just like to be able to play this game more often, but I'm addicted to expansion maps.

Thread: Re: Interesting, but...

slowcorner — 2006-09-27T18:32:53+00:00

CortexBomb wrote:
Unless you're planning on going to Essen there is no way to pre-order this one Marc...

The best bet for those of us who can't go to the fair is to hope that Funagain or similar online rapscallions get ahold of the box and sell it for 50-100$ when it is only 15 Euros new.

OK, reserve a copy for my great, great friend to pick up for me. Truly a wonderful fellow. If this turns out to be any good. Which would be nice to know. Hence the thread.

Thread: Re: Interesting, but...

ixnay66 — 2006-09-27T17:28:52+00:00

I'm going to wait until the Alice In Wonderland and Wizard of Oz AoS expansions come out.

Thread: Re: Interesting, but...

CortexBomb — 2006-09-27T16:52:25+00:00

Unless you're planning on going to Essen there is no way to pre-order this one Marc...

The best bet for those of us who can't go to the fair is to hope that Funagain or similar online rapscallions get ahold of the box and sell it for 50-100$ when it is only 15 Euros new.

Thread: Interesting concept, but how does it work?

slowcorner — 2006-09-27T15:27:24+00:00

I'd like a bit more info before I pre-order this. Are there rules for placing the tiles? Are the tiles constructed so cities are always a set distance apart, or do certain balancing rules get invoked if cities are x hexes from each other?

The only thing that really gives me pause is that I assembled a nice looking copy of Funkenschlag Atollis Modularis, and found that you had to be very careful how the board was set up or there would be serious balance issues. I'm mostly curious how this variant deals with that.

Thanks

Image

Ludo le gars — 2006-09-20T20:56:43+00:00