Game: Age of Steam Expansion #2 - Western US & Germany

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DrGrayrock — 2007-12-26T14:46:23+00:00

...a closer look (there's no "purple" cities, 'cause I didn't have purple pawns)...

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DrGrayrock — 2007-12-26T14:44:50+00:00

My home-made version...

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ansc1023 — 2007-11-06T00:12:52+00:00

Thread: Re: Western US AoS session: 4 players

scottredracecar — 2007-09-07T15:15:04+00:00

Good analysis. We tried this map with a 4-1 split with a brand new player alone in the west. It made for a very competitive game in the east and gave the new player an opportunity to get used to the game mechanics before there was major competition over the western cubes. I am eager to try the 4-2 split with experienced players.

Thread: Western US AoS session: 4 players

viktor_haag — 2007-09-07T13:59:34+00:00

We played this board for the first time last night with four people. It ended up being a two-two split east-west. The second western starting player got absolutely creamed. I was the first western starting player and I came in third by a nose. The two players who started in the east came in one-two with not all that much effort. Only an extremely lucky starting cube draw and a reliance on the production action managed to save my hide and prevent a much bigger gap between second and third spots.

I have a suspicion that, had the second western player started in the east, I would have easily cruised to victory in the game, thanks to the starting cube allotment. His choice seemed to be predicated on "wanting to even out the board" and "not wanting to leave me all alone in the west" (which was, as it turned out, a somewhat wise decision: by the time he had to choose, his choice was to leave me alone in the west with some attractive cube placements, or take the third best eastern starting spot and some extra starting capital: not a great choice). The upshot of his decision was that he did exactly as he thought he should do, and it succeeded: he stopped me from doing very well in the game at the cost of completely hosing himself over the long term.

I'm not sure that a 3-1 arrangement in this game is really practicable, because I have a suspicion that it favours the western player too much, especially if the player's allowed to choose production, and is left alone to play vertically along the western edge and not help the eastern players crack the mountain at all. To combat this, the eastern players are going to have to lean heavily on transcontinental shipments, and in our game there just wasn't much opportunity for that.

I think a 4-2 arrangement would work better because it would crowd the resources in the west and east and really generate a push to the middle of the map (in the 3-1, I don't think there's much incentive at all for the western player to head east).

I also haven't tried it, but suspect that a 3-2 arrangement, with experienced players, might work also, as long as the western players were careful to come to a sensible division of wealth.

Our general consensus was that this map was not, in fact, all that good for four because there was far too much wealth on the board for four players, and that it would play better with six (or at least, with five, if the players were all sensible about the meta-game).

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Thommy8 — 2007-04-19T04:35:47+00:00

Final Score = (Total score, income track, shares, tracks) -- Yellow (111, 34, -21, 30), Green (100, 28, -9, 25), Purple (84, 26, -18, 24), Red (83, 27, -15, 17).

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Thommy8 — 2007-04-19T04:34:09+00:00

Yellow and Green got all twisted up outside of Minneapolis, which was quite the hot spot!

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Thommy8 — 2007-04-19T04:32:46+00:00

Red was the only one out of four players to start on the West coast, and had San Francisco and Los Angeles all to himself, but ended up coming in last nonetheless. Those $5 mountains sure can be tricky to navigate.

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Thommy8 — 2007-04-19T04:31:25+00:00

Purple was the only one who headed through the swamps for the bayou of New Orleans, but he never did have time to ship all those cubes out of there.

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Thommy8 — 2007-04-19T04:30:16+00:00

Starting between Saint Louis and Des Moines worked wonders for Yellow as he won with 111 points, while the other players had 100, 84, and 83.

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Thommy8 — 2007-04-19T04:28:31+00:00

The mountains between Salt Lake City and Denver were avoided like the plague this game, with everyone taking a circuitous route.

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Thommy8 — 2007-04-19T04:27:00+00:00

Yellow leads the pack by a good margin at the end despite, or perhaps as a result of, issuing the most shares.

Thread: The Deutschland Sessions

rockusultimus — 2007-04-13T05:06:48+00:00

We had 4 players for a game of Age of Steam tonight so we thought we would try Germany since we had not played that map yet. What an interesting map!

Blue and Black both started around Essen-Dortmund and Koln-Dusseldorf and were competing with each other for goods for the whole game. Purple started in the south at Stuttgart and Yellow in the east at Breslau.

Yellow had some grand plans since Breslau started with 2 blue cubes and Dresden with 2 purple which made for good first few turns. The plan was to build down to Wien which had 3 purples and could make 6-link deliveries up to Breslau. However, Purple wouldn’t let Yellow get away with that and quickly moved south-east. With Yellow stuck making 2-link deliveries between Dresden and Breslau, he neglected his locomotive for too long. By turn 4, Purple had come in and moved all the purple cubes 6-links from Wien to Zurich. Yellow fell behind but remained relatively unopposed for the last few turns.

With Blue and Black fighting each other in the north and Yellow in a debt spiral, Purple took a large lead and only ever issued 8 shares.

Final score
Black: 67
Yellow: 71
Black: 77
Purple: 102

]]>

A very frustrating but extremely fun game and a great map!

Thread: Re: Germany Rule ? can you start ltrack from Foreign Terminal?

dedefortin — 2007-03-12T04:47:16+00:00

John Bohrer wrote:
I am sorry if I didn't make it more explicit in the rules, guys. BTW, nice Poland map, Phil. I hope you can make it to WBC this year, the French Canadians need tougher competition than us Pennsylvanians!

John
Pittsburgh

Beware if Phillip make it to the WBC for the AoS tournament. He was quite tough on the game we played with him on his excellent Age of Steam PBEM maps.

Pierre
Steambrothers

Thread: Re: Germany Rule ? can you start ltrack from Foreign Termina

John Bohrer — 2007-03-10T22:09:17+00:00

ckhalleran wrote:
Thanks John. And you just randomly pick the cubes for the 6 terminals, right? They could all end up one color. And those cubes just sit on the terminal all game (you can't ship them anywhere).

Yep, you got it, Chris. 100% right.

John
Pittsburgh

Thread: Re: Germany Rule ? can you start ltrack from Foreign Termina

John Bohrer — 2007-03-10T22:04:25+00:00

I am sorry if I didn't make it more explicit in the rules, guys. BTW, nice Poland map, Phil. I hope you can make it to WBC this year, the French Canadians need tougher competition than us Pennsylvanians!

John
Pittsburgh

Thread: Re: Germany Rule ? can you start ltrack from Foreign Terminal?

Boycat-OH — 2007-03-10T18:48:41+00:00

I stand corrected... thanks for weighing in, John.

Thread: Re: Germany Rule ? can you start ltrack from Foreign Terminal?

Boycat-OH — 2007-03-10T18:48:39+00:00

I stand corrected... thanks for weighing in, John.

Thread: Re: Germany Rule ? can you start ltrack from Foreign Termina

ckhalleran — 2007-03-10T18:43:05+00:00

Thanks John. And you just randomly pick the cubes for the 6 terminals, right? They could all end up one color. And those cubes just sit on the terminal all game (you can't ship them anywhere).

Thread: Re: Germany Rule ? can you start ltrack from Foreign Termina

John Bohrer — 2007-03-10T18:23:52+00:00

ckhalleran wrote:
On the Germany EXP # 2 map, is it OK to start laying track from a foreign terminal (it's treated as a City in that respect?) Or do you have to build from another city, and finish the connection at the foreign terminal? Thanks, Chris

Foreign Terminals are not Cities, they are terminals. Track must terminate there, Goods may not be moved through them.

So, one may build track from a City to a Foreign Terminal, but not vice-versa. One may not build Track from a Foreign Terminal, so it is not possible to build track from a Foreign Terminal to a Foreign Terminal.

John
Pittsburgh

Thread: Re: Germany Rule ? can you start ltrack from Foreign Terminal?

Boycat-OH — 2007-03-10T17:16:49+00:00

Yes, treat it like a city. Of course, there are the high building costs to take into account.

Thread: Germany Rule ? can you start ltrack from Foreign Terminal?

ckhalleran — 2007-03-10T16:27:00+00:00

On the Germany EXP # 2 map, is it OK to start laying track from a foreign terminal (it's treated as a City in that respect?) Or do you have to build from another city, and finish the connection at the foreign terminal? Thanks, Chris

Thread: Re: Age of Steam Western USA session report

John Bohrer — 2007-02-17T13:41:14+00:00

dedefortin wrote:
During this time Pierre was paying high amount to build in the west and decided not to connect the east. He builded a big loop and decided to wait for other players to pay to connect his network.

That is the key to winning as a western start in this map. Of course, Pierre is an AoS expert, but so are the other players!

John
Pittsburgh

Thread: Re: Age of Steam Western USA session report

Boycat-OH — 2007-02-13T13:57:44+00:00

That's impressive from Pierre - winning from a starting position in the west!

Thread: Age of Steam Western USA session report

dedefortin — 2007-02-13T04:11:24+00:00

Good old classic tonight with the first official AoS expansion map by Winsome game. This is the kind of map we appreciate in our group with simple rules but very challenging. We were 4 players tonight to play on this map tonight: Martin, Mario, Marc-André and Pierre. With these 4 players around the table we can always expect a very tough game.

Mario, Marc-Andre and martin bet on round 1 and Mario choose yellow urbanization with his first place. As expected 3 players started in the east (Mario, Martin, Marc-André)and Pierre with his last position was left alone in the west. Even if Pierre often said that he wouldn't start on the expensive side of the map he had no choice again On second round Mario started at 4$ for betting but Martin bet 5$ for the urbanization action. This way he was able to ship 2 goods for 3 income. He did the same trick on round 3 but this time it was very agressive on Kansas City to slow down Marc-Andre. Again in the next round the players in the east fighted hard for initiative as there wasn't much goods left. During this time Pierre was paying high amount to build in the west and decided not to connect the east. He builded a big loop and decided to wait for other players to pay to connect his network. Mario paid a high cost to build the transcontinental. He shipped many goods on this link with the special bonus but he had to give many income to Pierre. In round 5 Martin and Marc-Andre battled hard for first place. Marc-Andre finally won the loco action but Martin made him pay high for this action so Marc-Andre wasn't able to complete his loop in the southeast region. At this time the game was very close and we didn't have much money left at the end of each turn. In one of the last turns Marc-Andre took 2 additional shares to try to deny Pierre in connecting one of the eastern blue city but he couldn't. Pierre took the first build action on last turn and finally connected the east for nice shipment of 7 income.

Game was very close until the end. Even the players who couldn't cath the first player on last turn tried to improve their position and it made an interesting game. Again this classic scenario gave us a very challenging game.

Final scoring:
Pierre: 102
Martin: 87
Mario: 84
Marc-André: 78

Thread: Re: Germany-expensive edge cities did not appear to be a factor

Norbert Chan — 2007-02-11T23:46:37+00:00

Hi Mike,

Good catch on that one. We are not using the turn order properly, since in our game, the player did have to outbid himself.

Thread: Re: Germany-expensive edge cities did not appear to be a factor

Coyotek4 — 2007-02-11T21:31:59+00:00

Norbert Chan wrote:
Turn 2. Using turn order, I was able to go first. I decided to choose engineer ...
I wonder if you are playing 'Turn Order' correctly. The rules state that a player does not have to outbid himself when an opponent uses TO. Thus, it seems that you should not have ended up better than second.

Thread: Germany-expensive edge cities did not appear to be a factor

Norbert Chan — 2007-02-11T19:07:34+00:00

Players: Don Smith, Jean Jodoin, Trevor Brooks, Greg Nicholas and Norbert (5 player game)

This was Don's copy of the game, and we began the day flipping through the expansions and decided on Germany.

I was never sure if I like Railroad Tycoon or Age of Steam more, but I after I asked Don if he had brought Railroad Tycoon, Don said it was too big to lug all the way up. I was a bit disappointed, so I think that just proved to me that I did like Railroad Tycoon more.

In the Germany map, there are many cities at the edge of the board that take at least a cost of 7. (The cities at the corner cost 12 to build towards!) However, the engineer lets you reduce the cost of your last track build by half, but you can only build a maximum of 3 tracks per turn. Also, Berlin automatically gets a goods cube during the goods replenishment phase.

I wasn't sure what strategy to pursue on this map, since it looked like you might be able to make a game out of the edge cities. I issued one share to give myself some flexibility.I decided to pass out first and go last (since I didn't want to pay 3 or more to go first). Don went first and built from Hannover to Essen Dortmund and the one track line from Essen- Dortmund to Koln-Dussledorf. (Those 2 cities remind me of the Korea map where the two cities that have a one track between them, give you 2 links with one track and it seemed to be quite powerful. I think Don remembered that Korea game we played in January 2006). Greg, going second, built from Munchen to Nurnburg and from Nurnburg to Stuttgart. Trevor, going third, urbanzied at Frankfurt and built up to Essen-Dortmund. Jean, going fourth, built from Hannover to Oldenburg-Bremen. That left Berlin completely unlinked to. I had chosen turn oder for next turn, so I gladly built from Berlin to Hannover. Being the first one to Berlin would seem like a valid strategy, and being able to get there while going last, it was all I could do to suppress an evil laugh. The drawback was that Hannover was crowded, but that was the only way I could make 1 income with the goods on the board. I increased my link by 1 (I didn't think I could have gotten 1 income) to play for the long term.
Income: Greg 4, Jean 2, Don 2, Trevor 2, Norbert 1

Turn 2. Using turn order, I was able to go first. I decided to choose engineer. Everyone laughed at me when I built normally to Dresden. They thought I would have built to Warshau, but I needed a city with good cubes on it. Knowing that now, I think I made a mistake, since that left urbanization open for Trevor, who urbanized Wurzburg. Greg was making a lot of income on his bottom cities. I raised my locomotive link one more time by not shipping one round, and Don, I believe used my Berlin connection once to give me an income.
Income: Greg 7, Trevor 5, Don 5, Norbert 4, Jean 3.

Turn 3. I spent $3 or $4 (issuing 2 shares) to go first and I spent it on engineer again. Again, I think urbanization was the right move, but I kept being mesmerzied by the espensive side cites beside Berlin, but really in Age of Steam, one has to get links to many cities, and if doing it by urbanization, you get first crack into the city, and it denies urbanization to others. So I took engineer and built to Breslau. Greg took urbanization and went to Freiburg.
Income: Norbert 11, Greg 10, Don 8, Trevor 7, Jean 5.

Turn 4: Spending $3 or $4 to go first, I did take urbanziation and went to Hamburg (from Hannover). By now, Don had built to Berlin and Jean had built to Warshau heating up the competiton for the cubes. Greg and I would be tied after this turn, but Greg had the southern most part to himself, and would be making 3 or 4 income on shipping.

Income: Greg 15, Norbert 13, Don 12, Jean 11, Trevor 9

Turn 5: Unfortuantely, I had the most shares on the board, while Greg had 3 fewer shares than me, and he had the best position on the board. Berlin kept drawing balck cubes, which really couldn't go anywhere as there were not that many black cube cities on the board.

Income: Greg 18, Norbert 15, Don 12, Trevor 10, Jean 9

Turn 6: Since Greg had 3 fewer shares than me, and higher income, it was too late to catch him. Trevor and I were now playing for second place since Trevor had 5 fewer shares than me. At one point, Jean went to the downstairs washroom, and yelled out "Trevor...". That meant he needed toilet paper. I said sarcastically, "Why don't you give him this expansion set?"

Income Greg 20, Norbert 19, Don 16, Trevor 14, Jean 11.

Turn 7 income was Greg 25 (5 shares, 4 links), Norbert 23 (8 shares, 5 links), Don 20 (8 shares, 5 links), Trevor 17 (3 shares, 3 links) Jean 14. (I didn't count the income reduction yet.)

Final Scores: Greg 45 +15 track = 60
Trevor: 33 + 11 track = 44
Norbert: 27 + 17 track = 44
Don: 18 + 15 track = 33
Jean 6 + 6 track = 12.

One interesting thing was that no one tried to build to Wien or Konigsberg, which by now had 6 or 7 cubes on them. Yes, it was expensive (12 cost to get there), so I wonder if there is a strategy to try and get there? Greg played a good AoS game, building up many links to himself and shipping with no interference. I had 5 engine links, but most of the time I only earned 3 income per shipment, so that probably meant I had to find cities with the right cubes (either through urbanization or building to better cities).

Thread: Age of Steam Germany session report

dedefortin — 2007-01-25T03:33:50+00:00

The Germany map has always been one of the favorite map in our group and we don't argue long when someone suggest to play it. The rules are simple but at the same time it's a tricky map. It can easily sustain 4 to 6 players and there are multiple strategies to win a game on this map. Marc-Andre, Martin, Mario and Pierre would be the 4 contenders for this map tonight.

Pierre bet 4 on turn 1 to win the urbanization action and use the yellow new city to urbanize Hamburg and make a small loop and lock this area. Mario started near the Essen area, Marc-Andre started in the east and Martin was left alone in a good position in the south. Being alone in the south is often very good since you're not in competition with other players and can build a nice network but this in turn 2, Mario went south. Martin was surprise by this move but as we know Martin, he always find a way to build nice network and win games. On turn 3, Mario won the loco action easily for 2$ but Martin had another surprise when Marc-Andre also went south toward him. It would be tougher but Martin had seen worst and he would continue to fight until the end as usual. Martin then went north and his railway became parrallel to Mario's one. This way, he was able to steal some good from Mario and make big shipping even if he sometime gave 1 income to Mario. During this fight Pierre was continue to build a nice loop in the north and was trying to deny other players in going to his area. Marc-Andre decided to go for the low share strategy and wasn't building a big network. On turn 6 Pierre began to ship goods for 6 income and he would do this until the end of the game. Martin and Mario were still fighting for the goods left in their area so Pierre was able to pass ahead Martin. To secure his lead in the last turn Pierre went down in last place on the last betting round so he would not be pushed by his friend on the next level of income reduction.

Pierre won this game but again the competion between players was great and it was exciting until the last turns.

Final scoring:
Pierre: 91
Martin: 84
Mario: 82
Marc-André: 73

Thread: Re: Age of Steam GERMANY map Errors, Warfrog reprint edition

vvrood — 2006-12-01T13:12:08+00:00

I wish that I has seen this posting last week. With this information we will give the Germany map another try. The Western US map was enjoyed by all.

Thread: Germany Exp. good for 4,5, or 6 and reasonably forgiving

viktor_haag — 2006-11-13T16:26:51+00:00

We had five players to attempt a boardgame last night, and since (a) we'd all played Age Of Steam before, and (b) hadn't played it in a while, we decided to drag it off the shelf. We also thought it would be nice to try a board we hadn't yet tried, so we settled on the Germany expansion board.

This expansion has really two main features different from the basic game:

• The edges of the board are ringed with "long distance" links to foreign cities (these act a bit like the "Western Link" in Railroad Tycoon). To connect with these cities, you must pay the exorbitant cost listed in the plains hexes directly around the foreign cities (representing long-distance rail-line investments). Each of these long-distance cities do not produce anything; rather, they consume a randomly selected good type.

• Players may not build un-completed links, and the Engineer action does not let you build four tiles (it halves the cost of one of your tiles). This means that each time you build, you must build a complete link, and you cannot build more than four tiles. This tightness in building makes up somewhat for the plenitude of closely available goods.

The board also has a special "local" city: Berlin, which consumes black goods, and produces one random good per turn (not dependent on production rolls).

This expansion produces plenty of resources, and so we all thought it would play best with larger numbers of players (five seemed fine: no-one was every catastrophically squeezed for resources, despite the odd jab in the eye here and there). However, the tightness of the towns, the limitation on building complete links, and the lack of a four-tile-build power makes it slightly more difficult to construct reliable long links. No players were starved for resources, but there was only one or two six-link shipments in the entire game.

Urbanization has a critical role in this game, as it can turn your five-link deliveries into two or three linkers. If you're going to build on the outside edge of the board, then Engineer is critical, but you can play a central strategy and never need it. Build First and Move First seem almost as important in the early game as in the standard board, but by the time midgame arrives, they seem much less important. Locomotive and Urbanization seem even more powerful actions in this game than in the standard board, and the other actions even less powerful. This makes turn auctions more vital to time properly, and your ability to judge exactly how many shares you must issue and when to issue them more vital.

This expansion board seems set up to reward those players that have an even-handed approach, and make the best of their situation. The abundance of resources and universal tight building restrictions mean that those players who time and make the most clever builds, and time their locomotive advances best, will end up ahead of those less able to do so. Oddly enough, the relative abundance of resources makes the Production role quite useful especially if you get lucky -- the ability to seed cubes that will give you that extra link or two in a delivery can make a big difference in this board where everyone is scrapping for that extra incremental advantage.

Overall, the Germany board seems quite fun, reasonably forgiving, good for more players rather than less, and still will reward clever and well-timed play. If you have a large group of newbie players, or less capable players, then I think the Germany board would actually be a better way to introduce them to Age Of Steam than the basic board.

I'd rate this expansion highly, but the real problem is its availability. It's probably a rarity at this point, so finding it could be tough. If you can find one at a decent price and you already own the basic game, I'd advise picking it up, especially if your group often has five or six players.

Thread: Age of Steam Germany session report

dedefortin — 2006-11-10T03:02:25+00:00

We had a new player tonight, Anas and we decided to choose a map which had almost the same rules as the basic map. We were 6 players and little nervous since we didn't remember the last time we played as many players on the Germany map.

Adrien started the bet high at 4 on turn 1 and even overbet at 7 to get first build, it seemed a bit expensive for a first build. Adrien began in the Essen area with Martin, Mario and Nathalie started in the south and Pierre and Anas builded near Dresden. Many players took 3 shares on turn 2 and the bets went high and even 2 players bet twice. Nathalie choose urbanization in the south. Martin already had a nice network and he shipped goods at 4 income. Again many players took 3 or 4 shares and the bets went high and the turn order Pierre choose in the precedent round gave him only the 4th place ! Adrien won the bet at 10$ againt Anas and he urbanized in the center of the map. Martin shipped 2 goods at 4 income and made 7$ in the income/expense phase. Once again Nathalie urbanize in her region and the players in the north were anxious because she took the yellow new city. Later the bets went high when Adrien won with 8$ for locomotive action. Anas was finally able to connect Konigsberg. At this time most players had a hard time except Martin. Players were so short in money that Martin won a bet at 2$ as only 2 players still had money in the end.

The same story happened on this map as it looks as an easy but it finally turned a nightmare for most players. Martin builded a small but efficient network and won an easy victory. Anas was able to survive amidst chaos. Next game will surely be easier for him.

Final scoring:
Martin: 70
Nathalie: 51
Mario; 41
Adrien: 33
Pierre: 29
Anas: 0

Thread: Re: Berlin

John Bohrer — 2006-11-06T11:37:27+00:00

This and other misprints are covered in the thread "Age of Steam GERMANY map Errors, Warfrog reprint edition ONLY"

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/28500

John
Pittsburgh

Thread: Re: Are AoS Expansions #2 & #3 Going Out of Print?

Frog1 — 2006-11-04T15:55:20+00:00

To date Warfrog has neveer reprinted a AoS expansion map. Although I could never rule out the possibility I think that you can be 99% sure that these maps will not be reprinted. I have moved all of the stock from Germany into the UK to reduce storage charges. If anybody wants to buy a copy the best place to look would be Ebay.

Martin Wallace

Thread: Age of Steam – Expansion #2 Germany/Western USA: my view

RobM — 2006-10-06T16:17:39+00:00

Age of Steam – Expansion #2 Germany/Western United States: my view.

Preamble:
When this expansion came out, I had already played Age of Steam a lot, both with the original board and expansion 1. I wasn’t sure that I needed more maps, but I tagged this onto another games order anyway. I was not disappointed.

Components:
This expansion adds a new double sided map board, a single sheet of rules updates and a new income display card. One side of the board depicts Germany. This board has a significant amount mountainous hexes in the southern half, and a more open area with more towns and cities to the north. The main German cities are red and blue. The remainder are foreign terminals and stations around the edges of the map, all of which are more expensive to connect into the network (printed costs are shown on the map), and most of which are grey and subject to special rules (there are two stations each of purple and yellow). The only thing that I don’t like about the map is that the rivers have become a darker purple/blue colour rather than the original blue that is retained for the North Sea. Two of the cities (Essen/Dortmund and Koln/Dusseldorf) are adjacent and the rules refer to a white circle that should ornament the junction between the two…. this circle is not shown on the map.

The other side of the board depicts the Western United States. This map is very different to previous maps. There are a string of cities along the eastern edge, which are clustered by colour (three red cities of Duluth, Minneapolis and Des Moines in the north, and three blue cities of Memphis, Vicksburg and New Orleans in the south). The southernmost three cities are bordered by swamp hexes. The rest of the eastern half of the board is a huge area of open space with lots of towns. In contrast, the western edge of the board is extremely mountainous, with cities and towns somewhat unevenly distributed. As with the original board, there are two yellow and two purple cities, though for the first time, one of each of these is in a more central location.

The new ‘improved’ income display card is, in my opinion, not as good as the original. Fine, it now has a slightly more sensible income track (0-49, with corners at 15, 25 and 40 versus the old 0-47 track with corners at 14, 24 and 47). But, crucially, the player order track has been removed, and we find this to be extremely useful. We therefore continue to play with the old display card.

Gameplay:
I’m assuming that the reader knows the rules of the basic game. Gameplay for Germany and Western United States is subtly different.

Germany:
Grey hexes (they are supposed to be green, but they’re not!): these are foreign terminals that do not produce goods and do not allow goods to pass through them. During set up, place a randomly drawn cube in the white box for each of these cities… this will be the colour of cubes that each terminal will accept during the game.
Set up: 2 cubes are placed in every city except Konigsberg (3) and Wien (4)
Actions: The engineer action now allows one track tile to be placed at half cost, rounded up.
Building Track: Players are limited to placing three tiles per turn but they may only lay complete links (uncompleted track sections are not allowed). Building track to the foreign terminals and stations costs the amount shown on the board in the adjacent hexes (varies from 6 to 12). Track can be built between Essen/Dortmund and Koln/Dusseldorf for $2. This counts as one link and one victory point.
Goods growth: in addition to normal Goods Growth, Berlin always gets one goods cube, drawn from supply.

Western United States:
Set up: 2 goods are placed in each town, and 1 in each city, which should use up all the cubes. If a town is later urbanised, one good (if present) from the town should be removed to supply. Each player begins with $20 and 2 shares issued.
Moving goods: Some cities are classed as Eastern (Duluth, Mineapolis, Des Moines, St. Louis, Memphis, Vicksburg and New Orleans) or Western (Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Porltand or San Diego if urbanised). Moving a good from an eastern city to a western one (or vice versa) gains a bonus of $1 for one of the railroads travelled, determined by the player moving the good.
Building track: Railroads must start at Eastern or Western cities. Building across swamp hexes costs $4. Until one of the Western cities and one of the Eastern cities connect, all or a railroad’s track must be contiguous. The first time E and W are connected, a transcontinental railroad exists and it receives an immediate $4 bonus in income level. If the two cities are connected by 2 railroads, each receives $2. If the two cities are connected by more than 2 railroads, the player placing the connecting tile chooses which two railroads each receive $2.
Victory: ties are not allowed. If victory points are equal, ties are broken on most cash, then most track, then highest die roll.

So What Do I Think?
This is a very good second expansion, and I rate it an outstanding 9 out of 10. The Germany map, like the original, has a few foibles or mistakes (dark coloured rivers, no white circle between Essen/Dortmund and Koln/Dusseldorf; and those green cities that are actually grey/brown). But, it is an interesting board to play on. There are quite a lot of cities and towns, and usually plenty of goods around (with extra coming out of Berlin), but the restriction that only completed railroads can play is a counteracting force.

The Western United States map has a real pioneering transcontinental rail barons feel about it, which I really like. Salt Lake City and (especially) Denver can be pivotal as the only initial cities in the middle of the board, unless some other towns are urbanized fairly early on. Railroads can be expensive with all those mountains and a swamp to cross, but initial money is high (players are supposed to be rail barons with personal fortunes) and extra cash is available for completing the first transcontinental route.

Both maps offer something for the AoS veteran and relative newcomer alike.

Thread: Age of Steam Western USA session report

dedefortin — 2006-09-24T02:26:11+00:00

Half of our group went for a second game of Age of Steam tonight. Western USA map is always a tough scenario since your netwotk has to be contigous for most of the game and each turn is critical. There is always a chance of being caught in a corner of the map.

The bets were high right at the beginning of the game. Some players saw interesting opportunities. Marc-André started northeast with the urbanization action, Nathalie was in the south, Sophie in the middle part of the eastern part and Michel began his network on the western coast. Nathalie and Michel builded network that were very expensive and they had a hard time since they had to take more shares than the others. Bets were very high for almost all game long with plyers betting 10$ for urbanization or loco. On one occasion Marc-Andre bet very high to steal urbanization from Nathalie and she was caught in the south without much color different city to connect. Sophie had a break during the game when she was able to get loco. action when she was on 4 th place. If you add this to her very efficient network with many loops she was finally able to win this game.

Once again a player from the east coast won the game, If you start from the west coast, the challenge is greater and you no room for error. Game was very close until the last turns and we were not sure who would win the game.

Final scoring:
Sophie: 90
Marc-André: 82
Michel; 80
Nathalie: 60

Thread: Re: Berlin

BeyondMonopoly — 2006-08-15T22:47:22+00:00

Found the Answer in the "General" folder...

Thread: Berlin

BeyondMonopoly — 2006-08-15T21:46:06+00:00

I understand that the cities on the edge of the map cannot have goods moved through them. Does that rule also apply to Berlin? The rules do not state that this is so (they give rules about placing blocks in the squares and that THOSE cities cannot have goods moved through them), but Berlin is the same color as the others, and so the group here had a difference of opinion.

Thread: Age of Steam Western USA (grand father Mario)

dedefortin — 2006-06-30T05:15:58+00:00

Everybody agreed to play Western USA with 5 players. We always had good session on this map with 3, 4, 5 or 6 players. There is enough space for everyone but interaction is great even when the railways are contiguous. We were 5 players for this game: Adrien, MArtin, Pierre, Mario and Nathalie.

Set up of good was very tough at start and the initial bids went very high. Only 2 players were able to have a 2 income after turn 1. Pierre started his network on the west coast, the 4 other players started from the east (Mario in southeast, Adrien and Martin in northeast, Nathalie between Martin and Mario). There was many fierce battles in the east because some players were afraid of being trapped in the east. Grandfather Mario began his classic loop and we were afraid about the result of the game. Mario is always very tough when he is able to make loops. Pierre connected Denver early and made the transcontinental with Adrien and was later able to connect the red city in the east. At his stage the game was very close between Mario, Nathalie and Pierre. Then Mario and Nathalie went ahead with their nice and cheap network.

Final scoring was very close and Mario and Nathalie were tied even after the scoring of the tracks. Congratulation to Nathalie for her win, she can be very proud

It was Mario's birthday tonight, he is the eldest in our group, so he was called ''Pépère'' (grandfather). Even with all the disturbances caused by Martin he was able to win. Don't forget your pills before going to slleep grandpa !

Final scoring:
Nathalie: 86
Mario: 86
Pierre: 72
Martin; 60
Adrien: 58

Thread: Re: Are AoS Expansions #2 & #3 Going Out of Print?

John Bohrer — 2006-05-11T02:07:10+00:00

jtakagi wrote:
I guess my question is if this is on the way out, not to be reprinted in the foreseeable future.

I guess my answer is, if you want these expansions, buy them now.

John
Pittsburgh

Thread: Re: Are AoS Expansions #2 & #3 Going Out of Print?

CortexBomb — 2006-05-10T20:27:08+00:00

I think the answer to this depends on what you mean by out of print...the phrase seems to have taken on the meaning of "I can no longer find it for retail", and that I can't answer.

What I can tell you is that Warfrog, to date, has only done one print run for each of the expansions, and the boards are only available as long as that single print run lasts. In that sense, the expansions are immediately out of print, even when they are first released, because there is no plan to ever repress them in the future.

In short, if you want an AoS expansion board from Warfrog, I highly recommend buying it when it first comes out...they are always under 20$ new and they always seem to skyrocket in value once that run is gone from the shelves.

Thread: Re: Are AoS Expansions #2 & #3 Going Out of Print?

clearclaw — 2006-05-10T19:46:27+00:00

It seems reasonable that only Italy/France is still in print.

Thread: Are AoS Expansions #2 & #3 Going Out of Print?

jtakagi — 2006-05-10T18:41:19+00:00

I read a post a while back by John Bohrer that mentioned that Winsome were out of copies of AoS Expansions #2 & #3 and that we shouldn't ask the Winsome team at WBC, because they wouldn't have any. I can no longer find this post, however. Does that mean that they're now going out of print?

I realize that many retailers still have these in stock. I guess my question is if this is on the way out, not to be reprinted in the foreseeable future.

Thread: Age of Steam Germany

dedefortin — 2006-03-30T04:02:07+00:00

Two games in a row where we don't have to discuus long before choosing a map for Age of Steam. Germany is always one of our favorite, Simple rules and space enough for 5 or 6 players.

Mario had a good position as he was alone in the south. Pierre and Sophie were in the east, Martin in Sophie near Berlin. Mario was never really bothered even if there were 3 players who arrived in his region on turn 3. He had a good loco, costs in the south are cheap and he had the right goods in the right cities.

We're always surprised to see how high the bets are on this map even if it looks easy at firt. Each turn seems vital on this map. You never know what can happen if you miss only 1 turn. One of our favorite AoS maps.

Final scoring:

Mario: 70
Martin: 63
Laurence: 60
Pierre: 51
Sophie: 27

Thread: Re: Winsome Games Map

medievalbanquet — 2006-03-17T14:06:21+00:00

Thanks John

Thread: Re: Winsome Games Map

John Bohrer — 2006-03-17T13:32:57+00:00

medievalbanquet wrote:
Anyone know who on BGG sells the corrected map? I.E. Berlin being black and the foreign terminals being green? I have the warfrog one and it makes me crazy that it's incorrect.

Andy

The original Germany/Western US map predated the Warfrog reprint by a year and was sold out within a couple of months. It would not be fair to Warfrog to print more.

You might find one used, but folks just don't seem to sell their Winsome games. I saw one on the German Ebay a couple of years ago. Anyway, the original Winsome Games version was laminated paper, the Warfrog reprint was hardborad mounted, professionally produced in Germany. Much nicer bits!

John
Pittsburgh

Thread: Winsome Games Map

medievalbanquet — 2006-03-17T13:04:28+00:00

Anyone know who on BGG sells the corrected map? I.E. Berlin being black and the foreign terminals being green? I have the warfrog one and it makes me crazy that it's incorrect.

Andy

Thread: Re: Age of Steam Western USA

John Bohrer — 2006-03-16T02:07:35+00:00

dedefortin wrote:
Thanks John and Lucas
When we began to play this scenario, we were actually playing with the right rule, then someone in our group told us to read the rules carefuly and we tought we were not playing correctly....

John, I suppose your rule about the bonus income is really good since our feeling was that a good delivered on the Transcontinental should at least give a 1 income bonus and not 1$ only.

Yes, one dollar of cash is nothing, only 1/5 of an issued share. $1 income increase is quite valuable, the heart of the game. Sorry we didn't have the rules in French for you! Note that all references to Moving Goods in the AoS rules (and all the expansion rules) are in terms of increased income, never cash.

Keep up the good AoS expansion work, Pierre. See you at WBC!

John
Pittsburgh

Thread: Re: Age of Steam Western USA

dedefortin — 2006-03-04T21:29:30+00:00

Thanks John and Lucas
When we began to play this scenario, we were actually playing with the right rule, then someone in our group told us to read the rules carefuly and we tought we were not playing correctly. So we last year we tried 2 games in which we only had 1$ bonus for the goods moved on the Transcontinental. Nobody was really trying to finish the Transcontinental so we tought we really prefer the rule with 1 income bonus and we would play with our own variant !

John, I suppose your rule about the bonus income is really good since our feeling was that a good delivered on the Transcontinental should at least give a 1 income bonus and not 1$ only.

Thread: Re: Age of Steam Western USA

boomtron — 2006-03-04T00:29:56+00:00

Pierre,

Actually, from this thread:

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/97000

it was pretty clear that the bonus actually is 1 income, and not $1. (Despite what the rules may seem to say.)

Thread: Re: Age of Steam Western USA

John Bohrer — 2006-03-04T00:24:42+00:00

dedefortin wrote:
Very exciting game on this map. Since last year we have a variant for the Transcontinental. So, instead of having a bonus of 1$ for each good that is shipped , we give a bonus of 1 income.

Actually, Pierre, you are supposed to receive $1 income bonus for Transcontinental shipping. Sorry that we don't have those rules for that expansion in French!

John
Pittsburgh

Thread: Age of Steam Western USA

dedefortin — 2006-03-03T04:21:52+00:00

We decided to try the AoS Western USA map with 4 players. We always had good game on this map with 4, 5 or 6 players.

As we often see, 1 player (Laurence)started in the west and the 3 others (Pierre, Mario, Martin) started in the east. With urbanization Pierre began his network in the northeast region, Martin in the center and Mario in the south. In the second turn , Mario linked the 3 red cities and cut off Martin and Pierre from these cities but at the same time he put himself in danger of being cornered on this edge of the map for the rest of the game. Laurence had a good start in the west and she didn't have to pay much for bids or tracks since she tried to stay on clear hex for some time. Pierre was able to do the Transcontinental with Laurence and later he was even able to connect Seattle. With this kind of network Pierre would ship many goods through the transcontinental with the special bonus.

Very exciting game on this map. Since last year we have a variant for the Transcontinental. So, instead of having a bonus of 1$ for each good that is shipped , we give a bonus of 1 income. We did this variant because in most of our previous games people wouldn't not put too much effort in linking the east and the west because the 1$ bonus wasn't interesting enough. With our variant the map became once again one of the favorite in our group.

Final scoring:
Pierre: 116
Mario: 102
Martin: 91
Laurence: 78

Thread: Re: Age of Steam GERMANY map Errors, Warfrog reprint edition ONLY

woundwart — 2006-02-26T10:15:57+00:00

For an excellent list of AoS expansions see Cortex Bombs exhuastive list
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/5009

Thread: Age of Steam Germany

dedefortin — 2006-02-12T04:49:08+00:00

After a 6 players game on the basic , a 4 players game was a relief for most of us. Martin and Pierre started in the north and Adrien and Marion in the south. The set up was great for all of us during the first 3 turns and the game was very close. The bids for loco went very high since there was many goods to deliver then in the last 3 rounds it all change and we were trying to find deliveries of 3 or 4 income. Pierre was able to connect the south region and it gave him the goods he needed for the last rounds. Martin could have won the game but Adrien took (or steal ?) a black good from Martin to deliver it to a city Martin had just urbanized.

Again we had a very fun game on Germany expansion. Rules are simple but it's very challenging. That's what we like about this game.

Final scoring:
Pierre: 79
Martin: 76
Adrien: 72
Mario: 67

Thread: Re: Western USA: 1$ Question

DanHarrow — 2006-02-09T08:21:28+00:00

Hi John!
We played it right yesterday evening with 5 people -- and this time with all (!) cubes. It was great fun and took around 2 hours. It was the first time we played it with my self-made extensions on this map and it worked just fine.

Greetings
Harro

Thread: Re: Western USA: 1$ Question

John Bohrer — 2006-02-08T23:52:16+00:00

Harro,
Verzeihung, schlecht deutsch. Spielst Du die Westliche US Erweiterung, denn sagst du mir, was passiert, OK?

John
Pittsburgh

Thread: Re: Western USA: 1$ Question

DanHarrow — 2006-02-08T15:59:36+00:00

Erklärst Du mir, was geschieht, OK?
Pardon me? I thought, I already explained all ...

Thread: Re: Western USA: 1$ Question

John Bohrer — 2006-02-08T15:06:31+00:00

Grüße Dich,

Aha! Ich dachte so, gut für Dich, Harro. Jetzt kannst Du es richtig spielen. Erklärst Du mir, was geschieht, OK?

Später,

John
Pittsburgh

Thread: Re: Western USA: 1$ Question

DanHarrow — 2006-02-08T08:06:12+00:00

Hi John!
Alles wird gut, ich habe die fehlden Steine gefunden: beim letzten Spiel des Original-AgeOfSteams hat jemand einen Teil der Güterqauder in den falschen Beutel einsortiert, der dann am Ende des Abends in die Serinissima-Box gewandert ist. Bei späteren AgeOfSteam-Spielen und der West-USA-Erweiterung ist uns nicht aufgefallen, dass Steine fehlten -- lediglich dieser eine Satz in der Regel war deswegen merkwürdig.

Viele Grüße
Harro

Thread: Re: Western USA: 1$ Question

John Bohrer — 2006-02-07T23:22:35+00:00

DanHarrow wrote:
Für die ausgegebenen Aktien und Anzahl von Loks habe ich eigene Karten gebastelt, die jeder Spieler vor sich liegen hat

Sehr nett. Bis später, Harro.

John
Pittsburgh