(We've been playing all along that it's perfectly legal to take out the second loan to pay interest on the first loan. It can even occasionally be part of a viable strategy, if you do it just before selling a tasty shipload.)

(Have I mentioned recently that some of the local players are obsessed with this game? Great job!)

Has anybody here been caught with a loan they couldn't pay interest on, other than in a learning/we-have-no-clue game? I haven't seen anybody come even close yet in almost a dozen games. Maybe we're just fiscal scrooges.

If I default on a double loan...

We've only played twice, but I gave a quick "don't be dumb" warning before we played. Loan repayment was never an issue.

For the record, we used open money with poker chips, blind bidding, and skipped the beginner variant.

If you start with this, you may as well finish with this. In fact, you may as well get up from the table, and go make a sandwich.

If I default on a double loan, and one machine or warehouse gets seized to pay off the first one, am I then forced to take the second loan out again to raise money to pay interest on the other loan?

Is it my imagination or did it just suddenly become profitable to buy a $7 warehouse to get seized to pay off a $10 loan if the numbers work out perfectly?

(We've been playing all along that it's perfectly legal to take out the second loan to pay interest on the first loan. It can even occasionally be part of a viable strategy, if you do it just before selling a tasty shipload.)

It appears that the only way to recover from defaulting on a double loan (once all of your containers are gone) is to have this happen while you have containers on your ship. Otherwise you have no means of ever getting more income.

Thanks very much for clarifying that the $4 warehouse and the $6 factory/machine are exempt; everyone locally had read the rules otherwise.

(Have I mentioned recently that some of the local players are obsessed with this game? Great job!)

We had a three player crash and burn. Two of us had two loans and ran out of money. The third player only had one loand, so he laughed at us and simply shuffled containers around. He didn't win, but went bankrupt last.

As a result of a game (first one!) where 2 players went bankrupt (with 2 loans each) - the rules and errata don't seem to say exactly what happens to seized containers. Do they go out of the game completely, or do they go back to the container pool? I would think the first, else the game would be prolonged quite a bit.

Mark

The rules (AFAIR) say that you can sell a container for $2, but don't say if there is a limit on how many you can sell (but I might have missed that).

The indefinite article is singular.

This is an official change to section 4.1 - "Pay Interest". The rulebook, as printed, has this information stated in a somewhat clouded manner. The following is how the section should read, starting from the second paragraph.



If a player cannot pay his interest, the bank seizes one (or more) of the delinquent player's Containers for each loan in default in the following manner, repeating this procedure for each loan in default:

The bank seizes 1 Container from the delinquent player's area on the Foreign Island Board.

If the delinquent player has no Containers on the Foreign Island Board, the bank seizes 2 Containers from the player's Harbour Store.

If the delinquent player does not possess enough Containers in his Harbour Store the bank seizes 1 Container from the Factory Store for each Container not successfully seized from the Harbour store. It is possible that a player will have no Containers in his Harbour Store to be seized, and so the bank will seize both the Containers from the Factory Store. In the event that a player only has one Container in play in either his Factory Store or Harbour Store (a total of one, not one in each area), the bank seizes only one Container for the defaulted loan for this turn only.

For example, if a player has one defaulted loan, 1 Container in his Harbour Store and 4 Containers in his Factory Store, the bank will seize the 1 Container from the Harbour Store, and additionally seize 1 Container from the Factory store, leaving the player with just 3 Containers in his Factory Store and no Containers in his Harbour Store. Additional defaulted loans could further reduce this total.

If the delinquent player has no Containers in play at all, the bank seizes either a Warehouse or a Machine. If a Warehouse or Machine is seized, the player may return one loan document to the bank, as it has been paid off by the asset itself. The delinquent player must exhaust all other measures (above) before allowing the seizure of a Warehouse or Machine, and may not willingly lose a Warehouse or Machine unless it is the player's last option. The "-" and $6 Machine and the "-" and $4 Warehouse are always safe and cannnot be seized by the bank.

In the event that the player has nothing that can be legally seized by the bank, the player may avoid paying the remaining interest for the current turn only.

In all cases, selection of the seized Containers, Factories or Warehouses by the bank is done by the player to the delinquent player's right. Selection is NOT done by the delinquent player himself, with the exception that if they player is to lose a Warehouse or Machine, the player may select which of the two types of assets they will lose. In the case of a Machine, the player to the right will still select which colour to be seized.

Any Containers seized by the bank are placed back in the box, and out of the game. Any Machine or Warehouse seized is simply placed back into supply.



EDIT: Added a few "n"s here and there... mostly for dramatic effect. I may add a few more again later.

The indefinite article is singular.

I think I've seen people take out the second loan to pay the interest on the first loan, but that would have been a while ago.

More to the point, I've seen people with one loan spend every dollar they had, confident that if they didn't get any income from their factory store or warehouse, they could still take a second loan to pay interest.

The "-" and $6 Machine and the "-" and $4 Warehouse are always safe and cannnot be seized by the bank.