The Tao of Gaming

Well, the two Command and Colors sets felt unloved as RR Tycoon claimed the table for game night. Ya'll know I loves me some Age of Steam, so no tears here.

Eagle streamlined the game nicely. It took us around 2 1/2 hours with rules, which isn't much. I like several of the rules changes, in particular each turn has three actions instead of one build action and two deliveries -- it's more free form. As for the VP/Income track: tastes great, less gamey. Instead of just scoring VPs for each piece of track, you race to form important lines. The game has a fluid ending.

The rule that you most control the first link of each delivery has a huge impact, one I didn't grasp for a few turns. I like it.

The rest of the changes make the game forgiving and random. Instead of auctioning off all player order, you auction off start player. If you don't care you may go second or last. [In Age of Steam, you'll rarely earn second for free]. The modul cards seem unbalanced. I could have earned 6VP for having the most links. But another players card awarded him some VP for "most consecutive links." So we're in a fight. If either of those cards don't show, it's better for the other.

The deck of events isn't so bad, by comparision, since you auction off start player and most of the cards are visible at the start.

Some people will prefer the randomness. I prefer the original, but RR Tycoon still succeeds as a good AoS variant. I'll happily play it again. I just ordered AoS expansion #4; but see no reason to get this (particularly with the horrible board warping issues). Still, a happy game to play. If I had played this first, I think I'd still prefer Age of Steam, but who can say for sure?

Apart from being on the schneid at Race (I've lost something like 8 in a row), I got in a game of Rails of Europe. This is an expansion to "Eagle's very popular game about building Railroads." (I guess there was a trademark fight about Railroad Tycoon, because the expansion has Glenn Dover's name, and Eagle's logo ... but those words don't appear anywhere).

Anyway, I've already mentioned my thoughts about Railroad Tycoon, so just a few random thoughts.

• This is 'done right.' A small box with just the map and cards. Re-use all the components. (Not that I own RR Tycoon).
• There are something like a dozen baron cards, and you get to draw two and keep one. Hopefully they are more balanced. Hopefully an improvement.
• The major connections (points for linking two cities) are always available, unlike the original where they may show up or not. That seems like an improvement.
• I don't remember the original income track, but this seems the same.

Our game was fast. Maybe 100 minutes, with a few minutes of rules refreshers.

Having played another time or two, I do wish RR Tycoon was more unforgiving about cash. It seem taking out shares wily-nily to save actions always wins. Perhaps I'm just used to Age of Steam. Yesterday, If I guessed the ending turn correctly I would have lost by about 10 points, despite having taken out five shares to my opponent's twenty. (Each share subtracts a point at the end). One of those "Small rule changes has a big impact" -- how each game handles balancing the leader. AoS reduces income and VP; RR Tycoon has an income trace that stagnates, but costs no VPs.

In any case, I could see a number of variants that could easily shift the balance a bit (if so inclined). Make each share only earn $4,000 (instead of $5), or make each share cost 2 VPs at the end seem obvious.

I'd also consider going with an Age of Steam style auction for player order ... I don't particularly care for auctioning start player and then having everyone else go around the table.

In any case, Rails of Europe is a mild improvement and people who like RR Tycoon will probably like this. For me, it's something to play every now and then, and then remember that I should pack the original game ...