[Rails-devel] 18Kaas / 1830 Variants

[Scott P. <sc...@re...>]

Erik, thanks for the information about 18Kaas.  My impression is that
despite the game purportedly being created as a joke (I assume the "cheese"
is part of this joke), the game appears to be interesting enough to take
seriously.

As for the alternate map, the two changes would be:
* Remove the city in I8 (Gouda)
* Remove the terrain cost in I16

The other change would be to how the Ruhr is calculated.  Currently, I
believe Rails calculates the Ruhr value as the number of other cites and
offboards, but not dits.  I assume this the rule from your original copy of
the map (although I have also seen this reported as doubling the whole
run--perhaps a definition issue as to whether the dits are "cities").

Ron P also posted the following Ruhr calculation variants in the BGG thread
from his map (which I assume to be a later version)

3.1. Every train which includes the "Ruhrgebied" as the start or the end of
its route, gets a bonus of +20 for every city in its route (except the
"Ruhrgebied" itself), or...
3.2. Like above, but the bonus is +30, or ...
3.3. Every train, which includes the "Ruhrgebied" as the start or the end of
its route, doubles its revenue.

For the alternate map, I would prefer that 3.3 is adopted (similar to the
current implementation, but dits are also counted).

As for how important implementing the alternate map is, I would say that it
is of medium to low importance to me, but I'm not at all familiar with how
much time it would take to implement.

What would be even more appealing to me would be to add the 1830 Coalfields
variant.  I could make a concise list of changes if it would be helpful.
Mostly, it is just minor map/train modifications plus one additional
company, although the coal rights certificate would perhaps not be as
straightforward to implement.  By the way, I am interested in this variant
because it reduces the chance of bankruptcy, which is somewhat prevalent in
my recent 1830 experience.

There is also an 1830 Reading variant (to be used with or without
Coalfields), but that introduces triple shares.  I would be willing to
provide a concise list of changes for that variant as well so that you could
decide whether it is worth the effort to add.