Happy good afternoon...

The latest map for Open Rails features a swath of land from Lake Erie to the highlands of West Virginia.  I ended up playing with regular rules with two players.  The map played a little flat on the base rules, but I wanted to get a feel for how it would go to just play it that way.  The map seems very balanced between the off board areas in the south and the urban centers of Detroit, Cleveland and Buffalo.  The off board areas are guarded by mountain ranges.  The railroads seemed pretty balanced all in all with very little contention unless there is building towards other areas or collusion between pairs of railroads.

So, it played okay.  Nothing terribly exciting.  Game played pretty static with two.

The rule change I'm thinking of adding is adding the notion of shares of industry.  The idea is to take a certain aspect of the map which is a different slice of the game action that promotes another game goal without explicitly throwing victory points.  On this map, coal was a major driving force, came from the mountains and was brought east or to the port cities on Lake Erie.  I'm tinkering with the idea of a "sixth" company that deals with the notion of the coal industry.  Basically, there are no trains or moving parts to this company... however... revenue from the company is based on the amount of mountain track from all railroads on the map.  As opposed to the regular railroad company shares, each share receives a portion of the final income similar to how Chicago Express handles it shares.  So, for example, if there are 10 cubes in the mountains and three shares have been purchased, each share would be worth $4, rounding up.  The value of each share in a future round would be worth $4.  Money earned from this industry can then be put into any participating company in that company or it goes right into the shareholder pocket.  These shares would sell for $1 if someone needed the money.

Another idea I had was to include a second industry (mail, maybe) which would encourage connected railroads from each map edge by any railroad.  I also like the idea of having only 3 shares available of each industry to force a little more contentious bidding.  Another idea I was tinkering with was the idea of "construction" companies which would make plowing through certain areas or terrain a little less expensive.  Money is tight in the game as it is and this would accelerate the train rush a little more too.

Need time to tinker.  Unfortunately, with the way my next two weeks is looking, I doubt I will have the chance to play around with things much as there is some major programming to do for the primary job, hence the April time frame.  Maybe I'll luck out and catch a break...

Just a very quick update that rules clarifications continue for Open Rails Origins.  I'm hoping to have something more cohesive this weekend.  I'm working on non-board game stuff (read: real job stuff) and my time to the hobby has dropped off considerably this month.  Nonetheless, I'll try to pull through at least the rules changes.

I've also had the chance to start a PBEM game of Steam Barons.  We'll see how that goes as well.

Thanks for following!  I've had a few other ideas for games, but I have not had a chance to flush anything out..... not enough hours in the day.

I spent time handcrafting a VASSAL module for Steam Barons this week and it looks like there is enough interest in getting a game going!  I'm excited as this game is really interesting to me and I'm looking forward to seeing some other train gamers go at it from around the globe!

Slightly updated rules for Open Rails Origins have been posted.  I will be working on a new map for the game as well as a VASSAL module for people to play other remotely.

Other than that, gaming wise, not much going on.  18Card will see more development in the next few weeks to see if there's anything salvageable.  I ended up round cutting the corners on all the cards to get me more in the mood of trying it.  I'm thinking of coming back to the election game I had been working on as well just because it was so demoralizing.  I'm hoping to meet up with North Coast Gamers in the future more as well - just hasn't been time.

Otherwise, just sledding and working my tail off, trying to stay out of trouble.

Mom was very kind in her giving this year and I got some games designed by people other than me!  Yay!

They were Steam Barons (which I tried out solo here a little bit ago and it looks great!), Revolution! and Power Grid.  I'm going to try Revolution! with the girls next and we'll see how that goes.  Power Grid is probably too meaty for home, but hopefully I can find some other gamers to give it a try sometime.

Merry Christmas!

Wife and I had time to go over what we had bought for the kids for Christmas the other night.  Like all good moms, Betsy was worried about keeping everything even.  In the past, this usually involved gathering all the presents and putting them in different piles.  The one downfall for this method involves having everything out and ready in one place.  She is a very visual person and usually needs to see everything laid out in front of her.  Me and my abstract self can usually picture how things break down in my mind and work from there, but then again, I've never been completely in charge of the present buying operating around here.

So this year the question came up again and she was not looking forward to tracking down all the presents to figure out how best to divide them. 

This year I actually had a good idea and it was based on my board game creation experience in the past year.  I recommended simply to put each toy on a card, maybe throw the price and relative size on the card and arrange them until she was satisfied.  She said it was a good idea, but then to my surprise later in the evening, she cut out some cards with toy names on them and was shuffling them about.  She even made the cards different sizes (which I wouldn't have thought to have done) and wrote out what she wanted.

Amazing how different interests and hobbies can alter your problem solving skills without you being aware of it.

Regardless... hopefully your presents are all ready to go tonight!  A good holiday for everyone everywhere in the world - and thank you for taking the time to read this blog.  If you have had the chance to try out one of the games on this site in the past, thank you very much!  A big thank you to all those who have helped make the games this week that much better.  

Here's to a great holiday and a wonderful new year!

Mental note:  Man, what a weird acronym - On the other hand, I think it's Spanish for gold, so it can't be all bad!

As I was hoping, I was able to get a test play in on a three player game. Player #1 began yellow at $12, Player #2 went with Red at $10 and Green at $9 and Player #3 started Blue at $12.  Game went pretty well for yellow with trains moving fast and furious in the first three operating rounds.  #2 had to dive into his own pocket to save red with $20 to help buy a train.  Blue had three trains at one point but started Purple at too low of a par and was $1 short to start building track from Mobile.  Yellow placed a blocking station in Birmingham which messed with L&N's north/south run so they built a siding to the west.  All told, #1 won with $352, #2 was second with $319 and #3 was dead last at $223.  

Overall it progressed nicely with three.  I can't decide if I like the game better with three than two.  Companies had interesting decisions to make the entire game and upgrading home towns seemed to help dividends out.  The first 3D train gave Green a nice jump in income.  More cubes and a higher par price might have made green much more potent in this game.  I was surprised Red made it to the top of the stock ladder.  Total game time edged toward 90 minutes, maybe a hair less.  Not sure how I feel about that, but things were engaging, so I'm not too worried.  I have to get this one out with my brother at some point to see if it stays at 90 minutes or rockets up as he tends to put a good deal of thought into each of his moves.

More playtests soon, but it played out really well.

 (Final board position.  Amazing how I can fit that much stuff into a corner of a table top.)

(Final board position, close up.)

Just a quick heads up that the first version of Open Rails Origins - 18AL is available as a print and play download for nothing in time for the holiday season!  Download via the links to the right.  If you notice any glaring errors, issues or other problems, please feel free and email me.

I should have a page up at BGG by the end of the weekend.

Enjoy and happy holidays!

Jack

Quick note:  A few inconsistencies (cube count and rewording of the Cleanup section) have already been found.  A new version has been uploaded to the site.

Quick note #2:  Station counts have fixed on the company charters of the mat board.  Duh!

Quick note #3:  Changed a tile from First Auction to First Stock!  Refresh your cache and grab the latest.

I had a little extra time today to try a different map out for the Open Rail system... this time I ported over the ever popular 18AL map from 18xx over to Open Rails pretty much as is.  It took about two hours all told to redraw it in Hexdraw, center things up in Inkscape, create new shares, export to images, import said images to OpenOffice, create a document for said images to export to PDF so that I could finally load up Foxit to print the PDF's out!  Would it be worth it?

I think so.

I went ahead and did a solitaire game that finished up in 25 or so minutes.  It played well enough.  It's not as engaging as Bindle Rails is for me although there are some interesting decisions that are still in there.  I think its more of a puzzle than anything else, but still a good time waster.  I'll have to consider other ways to get rails going on the map.  But for now, quickness is kind!

The more interesting trial was the two-player test.  I played both sides and the game ended up with player #2 winning by only $15 to the tune of $587 to $572.  During the course of the game there was one company dump, a few forced train purchases and a last minute dump by #2 that killed green stock from getting to the top - which was enough to win the game thanks to extra stocks in the portfolio.  Start to finish the game took an hour which is 1/2 to 1/3 of the time it took for the main Open Rails game to play.  

The map played much more fluidly than the Maryland/Delaware one I had created on my own.  The one omission I made was to remove TAG from the company roster as I wanted to keep the number of companies small for a two or three player game (and particularly for the one player game).  There were many ways for companies to build (and get stuck) and I could see this being a tight contest for two experienced players.  I'm hoping to squeeze in a three player game on Friday or Saturday.

Overall, playtesting went well.  I have a few changes to do to the mats and boards.  I removed the third operating rounds from turns 5 and 6 which shortened the game considerably and removed some of the "calculator" rounds at the end.  I also have to fix the map so that certain impassable ways from the original map are fixed up.  I also need to port the rules of the new version over to this map as there are some changes in share limits and the entire solitaire game needs explained at some point in the rules (as well as credit 18AL's creator).  I'm hoping after a few more private playtests than I can up a version up on BGG (and here) so that the system is out within a week or two.

The one part I am rethinking a little is the train rush.  It is pretty good in the beginning, has some implications in the middle, but is absent at the end as things are just too expensive.  I'm not sure how to change this or if I really want to.  It's not as fluid as I would like it to be.  I'll have to sleep on it.  It's still more fast paced than its older, bigger brother though.

It definitely feels more polished and compact than the original Open Rails, although I must admit I prefer the original for a more immersive experience.  The one hour game time for a two player game is very reasonable and most of the aspects of 18XX (and other games) held together in the short time frame without dragging on forever.  In general, I am quite pleased with it.

Poor camera phone quality snapshots are below. 

(Solitaire game - minimal building, lots of shares, relatively good score of $278.)

(Two player simulation.  Lots of places on the map for competition to erupt.  Yellow was the clincher, but Green took a $48 dive at the end that swayed the game.)

After a little soul searching, I decided I want to pursue a dual track with Open Rails.  I really would like to see the base game published, however, I don't want to give it away for precisely the same reason.  The time I will have to dedicate to gaming is going to decrease as the months progress as well.  

Also, with all the positive playtesting feedback from Open Rails, I still had some things I wanted to do with it.  It's a game that takes anywhere from 2-4 hours to play depending on how deep the analysis goes.  It has a good number of bits.  It doesn't really scale all that well to solitaire play either.  

What to do?

I have decided to begin work on a print and play version of Open Rails for 1-3 players that will hopefully be ready by the time Christmas rolls around.  Like most of the projects I've worked on, the map will fit on one 8 x 10 sheet of paper and the tracking mat will fit on another 8 x 10 sheet.  The game will feature five public companies with five shares each.  Additional cards to track player actions and player order will be provided.  The number of cubes required to keep track of each company will be reduced from 25 to 16 or 17.

I decided to break out Inkscape and Google for information on the Washington/Baltimore area of the country and I ran across a few good web pages and maps from the 1850's.  I was able to whip up a map in Hexdraw after cropping what I wanted from the historical document that I found showing Maryland and Delaware's main railroads.  From there, it was a matter of taking elements from the Open Rails work I had done prior and doing a small bit of rework to get everything to fit.  

As for rules, I decided to stick with most of what I had for Open Rails already.  The only key change was dropping the number of turns from 8 to 6 and changing the number of trains and cubes based on a map that was a third of the size of what is found in my original game.  Three rungs were removed from each side of the stock chart which now runs from $0 to $40.  

The fun part was drafting up solitaire rules which are most similar to 1829 Mainline in terms of the availability of shares.  Basically, five shares are drawn and out of that pool, a company can be created.  At the end of each turn, one share is drawn and if that company has been formed, its stock value drops one rung.  Most other rules are the same and the key is to luck out and get all the shares possible while balancing payouts and dividend withholding.  The final jump in the stock ladder goes from $30 to $40 and for owning five stocks in a company is a $50 play.   

On three games, I tallied cash/stock totals of $298, $211 and $404.  I had different formations of companies and different strategies evolved.  Compared to other solitaire train games, this one has a fair amount of flexibility and the map potential on this particular game system could be quite intriguing.  The good thing was that each game took under 30 minutes to play (and usually closer to 20 minutes).  Almost too short, but it is a good introductory walk in the park to the game system and key elements of the 18XX system in general.

As for the map itself, I will have to experiment a little as it is more unbalanced than I would like.  The entire eastern side is underutilitized (which was historically accurate).  The PRR seems to be extremely strong with the B&O a good second.  The B&P and RF&P are hemmed in if there isn't enough starting capital.  For the solo game in general, very little track building takes place because it is extremely difficult to get enough shares together.  Train development on the single player map is pretty limited as well.  I imagine that the two player and three player will be much more cut throat than Open Rails which to me is a good thing.  If the play on the 2 and 3 player games tanks on the map, I will have to find another venue or draft special rules.  We'll see.

But it looks promising.  I will probably circulate files to my band of playtesters in the week and hope that it gets a few plays in before a release on BGG on Christmas.

I've had a chance lately to take stock of my game collection.  After feverishly working on Open Rails for the better part of the last four months, I've walked away from it for a little while just so I can get some perspective.  The one publisher I was hoping to do the game has decided to wait on it and I am contemplating going it alone or just releasing as a print and play game.  I spent a lot of time getting this game down right and I'm quite happy with it, but, that's how things go sometimes.  It's easy to fall head over heels with your own design.  Sometimes its best to let it rest for a while and come back to it.

I've also taken a step back from my 18XX tile game for the short term to try and come up with other ideas for it.  It plays the way I want it to, but there isn't anything too terribly novel about it.  More work for later.

And Bindle Rails is still looking for a stock market game. 

In terms of playing games, my enthusiasm for Steam has finally quieted down a little.  I've been playing Age of Steam solo more lately.  I had a game of Steam against my brother and my seven year old in New York this past weekend and we didn't even finish because I was too far ahead and the kid was born.  Breanna didn't even want to play from the get go which was kind of sad, really.

I have had the opportunity to get in on some 18AL games via Rails and have been quite pleased with the pace of the games.  18XX seems to work well with PBEM.  Rails does a lot of the grunt work with the game and while I'm not a big fan of the graphics, the layout is logical and the programming team has been responsive to problems as they have arisen.  I'm in the middle of a four player game and about to go bankrupt, but it's been a great learning experience.

I will reflect on my 18AL plays and see if there is some other avenue I can work in with 18Card...  who knows....