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A group of Robber Barons are assembling around an oblong table for a session of 1848. They were me, Mikko (Ä), Antero and Matti. The very same group that played this game about a month ago, so everyone had at least some idea how to tackle this game. Some rules confirmations were made, but we went to the dutch auction pretty much as soon as we finished organizing the various components.
The auction went pretty badly for me. I had to buy the Tasmanian Railway for £100 just to ensure I get something. Antero (left from me) bought Trans-Australian Railway relatively cheaply (there is some speculation whether this railway is the new Katy in our group). Mikko was the winner in the auction, I think, getting North Australian Railway (at low price) and The Ghan (high-ish price). Matti bought the two cheapest ones Melbourne and Hobson's Bay Railway Company and Oodnadatta Railway.
In the following stock round Matti formed SAR at £90. I formed VR at £80 and Antero decided to float QR at £90. Mikko didn't have enough money to float CAR, but bought some shares of it anyway. On the following operation round nothing surprising happened. On second stock round Mikko was still unable to float CAR, but eventually succeeded on third (IIRC).
Let the games begin!
Fast forward a few operating and stock market rounds. Green era has just began, Mikko has finally got his CAR up and running. During the previous stock round he sold a few of his CAR shares to get some bank of England shares, which explains the loan he has taken. This was perhaps the first indicator that CAR would not be a high value company in Mikko's vision. Let's see what happens.  Looks promising still as SAR isn't playing wholly nice with CAR. Meanwhile VR (ie. me) is not playing nice with QR (Antero) as I take the K-tile that QR needs and place it (and a station marker) in SAR home, blocking CAR some more. This all instead of putting the Tasmanian port in play and getting nice cash. 
First 3-train sold, green tiles are available.
Between the the images up and down a number of things happened. Pretty much all companies managed to run rather profitably, though CAR and VR probably were the best at this. The timing of 2-train rusting also went my way as I was able to utilize my 2-trains to the fullest while denying it from others. However, this left VR's treasury nearly empty and the company wasn't able to buy my private (at acceptable price, anyway). The good news was that the value of my company was sky rocketing. Which gave me more than enough money to capitalize my next company. Mikko and Matti also decided to form second companies. The order was Mikko (WA), Matti (FT) and me last (NSW). I was a bit surprised that Matti decided to form FT instead of what I formed. All companies were formed at £90. This left Antero with plenty of capital and no companies to form. So, he decided to grab my VR (of which I had sold 3 shares to raise capital) at the steep price of £120/share. Matti had been in a similar situation as me, so he also sold most of his SAR shares to raise capital and Mikko decided to buy the company from him...
In the following operation round WA does something interesting. It buys the 4-train and 5-train. As one 5-train had been already taken by the bank of England (two companies had taken a loan) and two more companies needed still to buy a train, this meant that 6-train will be bought and 3-trains will rust. Antero was not happy about this as now he had two treasury poor companies with and only one 4-train. Note how once glorious VR's and QR's share price falls like a rock in the following pictures. 
New angle! Still during green era, though it's about to end as 3 companies were formed
One operation round later. Mikko sees that 8-train will come soon and he currently has 3 companies with 3 4-trains and one 5-train and not quite enough treasury to start buying 8-trains. And so ends the miserable takeover of SAR as Mikko dumps it back to Matti after making only losses with it. 
Meanwhile, I'm biting my fingers as I'm hoping that no-one forms COM. The priority is on my left. Antero doesn't look like he has money to form it, so I'm probably safe.. he doesn't. Good. Next Mikko, He just dumbed one of his companies and he needs desperately capital to his remaining companies. Oh, no! He's going to form it! No! He doesn't Yeeeesh! Okay next Matti. He could form it if he sold lots of FT. I think I'm safe here.. YES! I liquidize some of my shares to raise cash and form COM at £100. Now I have 2 good companies and my game looks good.
Brown era going, Antero's struggling to save his companies continues
Mikko had probably hoped I'd start paying out with my companies as soon as possible.. but Instead I started saving for more trains. Eventually COM ended up with 2E, 6+ train and a 8-train. NSW ended up with 8-train. This withholding meant that I didn't make much money during these three operating rounds. But nor did the others. Matti had to withhold too as SAR needed a train. Mikko couldn't pay out since one of his companies needed a train also. After some saving he finally decided to let the WA die, which left COM with 2E, 5-train and 8-train. Antero seemed the only one happy with his train set-up and started making cash.
Late stages of the game, surprisingly low income for the players
The last set of operating rounds was just running for income with not much interesting decisions. It didn't last very long either. Everyone, me included, was sure that I will win. Everyone was right, but I though that I would have won with bigger lead. In the end I had £5900+, Antero was second with around £400 less, Mikko was just a bit behind Antero and Matti was last about £1300 behind me.
I think the Bank of England shares could have been important in this game had they been less evenly distributed among the players. Another interesting thing to note is that pretty much all shares had quite low values (BoE was expensive) and this meant that the earnings during the game were actually quite deciding. During the last operating rounds my companies ran quite well. COM £88/share and NSW $39/share. Mikko's CAR ran £84/share. Antero's VR ran $46/share and QR £39/share. BoE was $44/share after WA died. Matti's companies didn't do so well. The game took a bit longer than last time, 5 and half hours.
The final board
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I think I got a dream start and everything went as I have planned until I got greedy and stupidly hijacked Matti's company. As Henkka said it did not do any good for me and investment was off from a lot better choices. I broke every principle I usually follow with that tremendeusly stupid move.
Minor gripes: Twice I did not buy additional train I had a chance for. The first was no crucial as I pondered whether I buy '4' train in addition to my 2x'3' train. I may be should have. Another time I totally forgot to do some transferring of trains between my companies (which I had three at the time). That was worse mistake.
But I lost the game thanks to my greediness...
There surely are some tough decisions available in 1848, may be the toughest of 18xx series as nothing seems to be sure bet and can be speculated to totally opposite one turn later.
.mikko
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Okay, it seems we have played one quite major thing wrong.
I just received an email from the designer himself telling me that one permanent train is removed after 2 companies are in receivership (and not after 2 companies have taken a loan as the English rules translation says). So the lesson here is: Read the FAQ, even if you think you understood everything!
How's that for customer service? 
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Breno K.
Brazil
Brasília
Distrito Federal
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MichaelB wrote: There surely are some tough decisions available in 1848, may be the toughest of 18xx series as nothing seems to be sure bet and can be speculated to totally opposite one turn later.
*drools in anticipation at getting a chance to play it* 
My suggestion to play it was shot down twice this weekend when I brought my copy to a friend's house... At least one of those times it was in favor of 1830 (one of the players didn't feel like learning new rules that night), and I won, so it's all good. (The other opportunity Dune got the vote, something I hope doesn't happen again)
Quote: I just received an email from the designer himself telling me that one permanent train is removed after 2 companies are in receivership
Ohley's a great guy. I've been exchanging e-mails with him with rule doubts ever since I got my 18xx shipment from him (1895, 1824, 1844 and 1848).
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Breno K.
Brazil
Brasília
Distrito Federal
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After playing two games, I can say: wow, you guys sure are fans of taking loans.
One thing: sure, if all players get an even amount of shares of the BoE, it won't influence in the final score to one player or the other, but it still influences the match: players had to make that investment, instead of other possibilities.
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BrenoK wrote: After playing two games, I can say: wow, you guys sure are fans of taking loans.
One thing: sure, if all players get an even amount of shares of the BoE, it won't influence in the final score to one player or the other, but it still influences the match: players had to make that investment, instead of other possibilities.
Might be 1856 effect, where all players like to take loans to hasten the train race. I think our train race might have been a notch faster (and we had one less 5 train to go around in each match because of a rule played wrong) because our end game totals are a lot less than with your group. 
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Posted Mon Jun 15, 2009 11:44 am
