I hosted the game at my house on a Friday evening. A number of us wanted to play some more 18xx, especially after a night of it recently. With some pre-game discussion via email, we decided on 18EU. The reasons included:
- we had 4-5 players
- none of us had played it before
- we all had played at least a couple of other 18xx games before
- I could get it setup ahead of time as I own it
- the rules were available online (so we could read them in advance)

As it turned out this extra level of planning really made a difference to the length and pace of the game. The group ended up being: Kent, Mike, Eric, George and Myself.

18EU differs from many other 18xx variants in that there are no private companies. The opening auction is for the 15 minor companies. It’s similar to a dutch auction and they all have to be sold before the first operating round. Having not played before, it was difficult to judge the relative value of the different starting locations that the companies offered. I think everybody guessed that the ones that started in Paris, Vienna and Berlin were probably more valuable, but even those didn’t get bid up very high. We all ended up with 3, mine were all in France and their proximity worked out fairly well for me.

We all started building track and running our 2 trains. For the most part we were trying to maximize revenue and looking forward to merging our minors into corporations later. What we didn’t realize was that the minors are really just stepping stones to get the corps open. They are not very useful otherwise. This has a lot to do with their tile placement restrictions - they cannot upgrade tiles. They get yellows and that’s it. Not understanding the impact of that made for some challenges. If you hadn’t planned specifically for merging (often at the cost of some operating revenue), it got very difficult to connect your minors so that they can merge.



A couple of us opened corporations and we all started to figure out what needed to happen. We lingered in phase 2 for a long time as people made some decent money with their 2 trains. Finally, Mike killed the 2 trains and we all upgraded ok, but then he killed the 3 trains and that hit us hard as his company operated first and few of us had any trains.

From this point on, the phases moved at a quicker pace. Before long all the corporations had been started and the board was getting crowded. We all hit our certificate limits. There was a bit of stock selling and one corp. changed hands, but overall it was not an especially turbulent market. Generally we seemed to be optimizing our routes more than sabotaging others - this was true of token placement as well.



We were well into phase 8 when the bank ran out - or at least came within 100 pounds. Mike won by a good couple thousand, I came in second. We ended up finishing in about 4 hours with 5 players. That’s a very reasonable time for this game and happened because we had all reviewed the rules in advance and made a conscious to effort plan our next actions during other players’ turns.

This is a good 18xx game with several rule idiosyncrasies that I believe will make future plays a lot more interesting. There were several ‘ah-ha’s for me. I also want to note that the copy I have is from DeepThougt Games and the production is excellent - the board is well mounted and the laminated hexes and info cards are very nice.

Hmmm, your minors are not working well together. Though the 1 and the 9 don't usually work with other minors, the rest do.

The two key things in the minor auction in 18eu (which I've played a fair bit, so probably just as well I wasn't in that game are:

1) To make sure no player ends up with more minors than everyone else. If someone does manage this, they get an early cash-flow boost, which is never a good thing for an opponent to have in any 18xx game.

and

2) To get minors with some synergy with your others. So as the auction goes on, you will be more interested in some minors, and less in others, based primarily on their synergistic value with the ones you already have. So, while you guys were correct in thinking those minors starting in the major cities would be big, the other useful ones are those that have good synergy with either those in the cities, or with a good set of other minors.

I've seen (but can't find here on BGG) a document that talks about bidding strategy in 18EU - I know the author, so I'm going to encourage him to put it up here as well.

Glad you guys enjoyed it, though - our first game was similar, with a lot of "wish I'd done that instead of this" moments!

Tim

The 'no one bought a three train because the two train was making money' comment baffles me: why not buy a three train if you can run it. Many of the minors (not all) can use two trains.

Similarly, it becomes obvious with more plays that you generally want to open your first corporation in the first SR: you make at least as much money, you get the cash to buy some more trains, and you get ahead in the stock appreciation game. Oh, and you can lay green tiles.

Usually the first 3-train, as far as I've seen, gets bought in the first OR of the 2nd set, either by a minor via some train juggling, or by the first major.

I just realised that I forgot two things that are relevant

1. Don't forget that in the first OR of all time the minors get two tile lays. This is quite important: this means that between two minors you get six tile lays to hook them up before the first SR, which is a long way. The 2 and 12, for instance, often hook up almost immediately, even if owned by different players.

2. The minors typically go for $60-$120. Vienna's minors are generally terrible, but if you can get two of them, plus a really good single minor (the #1) in a 5-player game you're doing well. Generally more north and more west is more money.

I've seen that too, but I googled it and can't find it.

In my own personal experience, M10 is almost completely worthless unless you also have M5. I've seen a few players lose specifically because they were stuck with M10 (including me!).

M13-15 can be very powerful because of their central location and easy access to plenty of little dink cities. Same goes for M2 and M12. The minors to the east out of Berlin (4, 7, and 9) and around Vienna (5, 6, 8 and 11) are not so good. Unless you have two of them that can connect easily (easily means you can merge them in SR2). Stay away from M10 like it's contaminated with the eubola virus or something. If you do get it cheap don't make a mistake by trying to form a major company out of just M10 with no other merge partner, just let it die.



We actually have a house rule that says if the auction ends with one player having more companies than everyone else, they win and we start over. Obviously this doesn't hold for a 4 player game, someone will be stuck with just 3 companies. If it's M1, M2, and M12 maybe they have a chance.

With some of the weaker minors, it often makes sense to set them up so that you can merge the minor (that of course will have no trains and no cash) with someone else's company. That's what some of the minors in Vienna and Berlin are for, IMO. Realize they aren't going to make much money and use them to move trains and cash around until the final merge round.

What's wrong with M10? Buy it cheap and milk it for revenue. Spend 60, run for 60. You get your money back by the first SR. And it's cheap enough that you can either bid higher or buy an extra minor.

M10 is ok for 60 at the start, but without M5 it will never be a good major company.