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!

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.)

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....

As alluded to very briefly earlier in the week, I managed to land a copy of Tresham's 1829-Mainline.  The game was produced in 2007 and comes 33 years after the first 18XX game was created.  It is a financial game of buying and selling shares, setting up railroads and running trains and track over the English countryside.  One of the main reasons why I picked up the game was that it featured a solo variant right in the rules and I finally had a chance to sit down and get through most of it tonight. Some of the more interesting points involve what I think of the stock market as being a "solitaire mini-game" where shares are purchased as they come off the stack.  The game also allows you to start laying track in yellow in one direction.  There are three operating rounds per stock round and there are variable cities which are worth more (or less) than your best static valued station on the map.  The trains are also "slower" in that they only go two to four stops, but later trains have the ability to start at smaller stations and work out, take the best four destinations on the route, or double-back on the same route for twice the money.  The map and tile mix are complicated and mesh together quite well with a limited pile of hexes to work with.  Finally, you can lay track in color order regardless of turn.  It was designed to be a more approachable 18XX game.  

I won't go into too many details about the session.  Essentially, I started running the GCR in the south and eventually started up the GCW up in the middle.  Eventually more shares became available and after paying out some healthy dividends on the first company, I was able to start the MR and then started the L&MW (?) the turn after.  By then my routes were earning $300+ for a couple railroads and it was a matter of time before holding dividends on the railroads would deplete the $3000 bank.  So I stopped after being two hours into it.

Some thoughts:

• It was a fun game to play seeing as Tresham's games have been around since 1974 and still chugging along (sorry for the pun - couldn't resist).
• The card game for the stocks is a neat twist, especially in solitaire mode, to force certain companies to be built before others.  The initial struggle for cash was also welcome.
• The board is tough to work through.  Several areas of the map are simply off-limits until the faster engines come out.  The station rules are different than in 1830 in that you have to be able to reach the next station with a current train.  Ouch!
• London didn't play prominantly into the game at first, but Birmingham washuge.
• I struggled with some upgrading rules, but things became more apparent after referring to a rules index found at BGG and keeping the real rulebook at the ready.
• This game has a lot of math in it in terms of multiplication and addition.  Nothing too bad mind you, but figuring out 23 pounds x 7 shares and working through the routes with variable station bonuses takes a fair amount of time to go through.  It's no worse than 18xx, but then again, that's one reason why 18xx simply isn't as popular unless you are running with a moderator to speed up calculations.

It was interesting to play this from a game design perspective.  I had a great time seeing what someone else had put together and the attention to detail was amazing in terms of tile layouts, board diversity, etc.  Open Rails is inspired from the 18XX family of games (1830 in particular), so it was interesting to play this game from the perspective of my own game design.  I don't 1829 Mainline is a game I could have designed as I would not have been satisfied with certain parts of it as a designer as some parts of it feel "rough", but it is definitely a welcome addition to the 18XX universe. 

It was also interesting to contrast it with a tile-based 18XX game I am working on at the moment.  Testing has been coming along rather well on it.  It seems with the 18XX style of games you will always have a certain amount of cold calculation to do, and even with square tiles with limited upgrades, no distinction between player and company money (the player is the company) and a freeform map, the game still ends up running 45 to 60 minutes for only five turns worth of action.  Why?  Because of all the calculation of routes, determining what pieces will fit on which track and how they go on the board.  Granted, all of my playtesting has been simulating two players so maybe it would faster with another person in real life, but I kinda doubt it.  The game also needs a little more pizzaz in terms of how actions can be spent and determined.  The game seems to be generating a few standard outcomes, but the range of scores has been great with most games won by $10 or less on a scale of $70 to $110 for high scores.  The game felt like a mini-18xx.  The questions is, do I really want to do this?  The answer is a self-assured yes, but I'm still looking for ways to trim down time and make the game less complicated while keeping elements of the series in the game.  This may not be possible.

Playing Mainline also had me thinking about a solitaire mode for Open Rails.  There has to be a way to do it and I'm hoping to mull it over this week when I'm out of town.   My one disadvantage is that the shares are colored through and through so there is no notion of a card back and it would be possible for someone to peek and see roughly what was coming up next in the stack.  Maybe it isn't a disadvantage.  Maybe its a feature.  Anyhow, the idea would be for a limited number of shares to be available to purchase from each round.  Since the game has 8 turns with 8 companies with 5 shares apiece, it works out at first blush to a seven card draw to start companies.  I'm thinking an abbreviated game of some sort would be in order, but the interplay of all the companies is integral to the regular Open Rails game and I'm not sure how well the game would survive without that tension.  

There are many kinds of games out there and the wife and I were playing Coloretto the other night before bed.  Nothing really terribly heavy at all.  It's a simple, quick game.  We love it.

It got me to thinking that maybe I should make some lighter games.  I love my brain burners...  Steam (even though some dismiss it, I find it a good mix of feast and famine), Age of Steam (I stink at it), 1960, 18xx....  I'll take damn near anything.  But the wife?  She tries, I'll give her that much, but it doesn't suit her.  I thought "Owner's Choice" might bring something to the table, but I'm not sure if it is going to fly or not.  I've played it on my own and like it enough, but it still might not be her thing.

The games she has said she's liked include "Mr. President" (which is still one of my favorite games), "Ticket To Ride" (which she prefers to play quickly on the computer), Blokus and Mancala.  She is an ex-political science major, so there are a few themes that I would like to work on with this.

So I wandered back to Owner's Choice and wondered if it would be possible to create a similar mechanic with an election game?  I thought about using different tracks and dice for the board, however, I think I'm going to go with cards for at least the board.  The idea is to have 24 or some odd cards with two "squares" on them.  These squares can benefit Democrats, Republicans, Whoever Lands On Them, or they may trigger events, issues or polls.  One player will draw cards and fill two tracks with five cards each.  Once both are filled, the other player picks which track to use.  Each game will go through 4 turns (or 40 tracks).  Each player then takes turn placing markers for "swing" states... any state that does not have a heavy advantage for one party.  Finally, 5 cubes go to each player as political capital and the remaining cubes go in the bag.  A turn pawn is placed right next to the first space on the "board" or row of cards. The remaining cubes (20 or so?) will go in a bag.

The other part of the equation are those event cards (or dice).  An event card will have a party (R/R/D/D/Any/None), a region (NE/SE/SW/NW/MW/any), a state (large/small/swing/winning/losing/any), an issue type (defense/jobs/economy/1/2/any) and yes, a party.  Depending on what card is drawn, other cards may need to be drawn to determine where players may place support cubes.

From there, each player must move the pawn 1, 2 or 3 spaces.  Each square has a different effect, but the general idea is to give the players the following options:

• If a player lands on their own party square, they can try to fundraise 2 cubes out of the bag.  Any matching cube may be kept by the player.  The player may also play one of their political capital cubes that matches three event card draws, first for region, then two for states.  The player can only modify one state at a time one level at a time.  (See below)
• If a player lands on an ISSUE square, a player may pull up to three cubes from a matching issue square and draw three cards, first for region, then two states
• If a player lands on a POLL space they may flip over the next three cards, return them to the deck, and then move again.
• If a player lands on a FUND space, the landing player gains 3 cubes from the bag to store as political capital.  The person who doesn't land on it gets to draw 1 cube.

One other rule...  Say the Dems have two cubes on California.  The Reps would need to match two cubes to remove ONE of the Dem cubes.  From there, they would need another cube to draw it even.  But each state has a built in bias, so California would require yet another cube.  Expending four cubes to switch a state is costly and would require three separate turns to do so.  

Once the pawn moves off the track, the player who is in the lead gets to pick whether they want to draw the next board or pick between the two rows.  If it's the end of the fourth turn, the cubes are tallied and someone wins.

Other ideas involve keeping player hands, but I think I'm going to stay away from this.  I'm also considering just sticking to six basic event types and making the entire game dice driven, although the POLL action would need to be changed.  

It could be a good print and play game.  It has elements of Owner's Choice with a different theme that works well with jockeying for position and the tit for tat that was part of the entire presidential election process.  I think I can make a fairly balanced game out of it electorally and the addition of player-based swing states could add some replay value as well.  There is a fair amount of luck, however, the possibility of drawing up a choice of region or state and two sets of winning/losing/large/small states appeals to me.  The fundraising and spending may need tweaked, but, again, I like the idea of fundraising being abstracted to the point of simply amassing cubes and spending them wisely. 

It still needs work, but it's a good start.  Maybe this weekend I can draft some cards and give it a go.

I had the time to play Coast to Coast Rails with four, Chicago Express with five and Age of Steam with three at Nordonia's Game Time on Saturday morning.  Coast to Coast was okay although many at the table were non-plussed.  I liked that it was a good gateway, but I didn't see the tactics behind it.  Maybe another play will change my mind.  Chicago Express was chaotic with five and one new player basically threw me the game by placing blocking track on another.  Age of Steam was with two veterans on first America and then Europe.  I have only played online, so playing these guys was truly terrifying. 

A game of train games is fine by me.

In the meantime, Open Rails has one global looking for playtesters.  Word from the publisher is coming probably by the end of the year and hopefully before the end of October.  We'll see what happens.  In the meantime, people have been plugging away at the rules and offering valuable feedback.  We'll see if it the game morphs much from how it sits now.

I had forgotten how much effort it was to get Bindle Rails out the door.  A fellow BGG'er made a request for one and I had forgotten how to make it.  I'm still not convinced I got it right.

The good news is, the recent request for Bindle Rails made it possible for prototypes of Open Rails to be shipped and made.  It's amazing to think that I can be soliciting publishers across the Atlantic, having artwork potentially being done by a guy in Scandinavia with playtesters in France, California, Washington, Maryland and New York.  I can run down the road 20 minutes and get materials to construct my own board games.  Considering how board games used to be produced, the ability to work with others and reach to others without major expense doesn't cease to amaze me.

Anyhow, playtest kits are going out this week and I'm looking forward to hearing from other play groups.  We'll see what needs done.  If the game isn't picked up by a publisher, I will go rogue and make it available here.