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8 décembre 2007 6 08 /12 /décembre /2007 16:07
Well, sorry for the lack of updates everyone, but I haven't had an opportunity to play Age of Steam since my last post, and I haven't had much time to do design work either, as life at university is keeping me extremely busy.

I just wanted to throw out some design rumblings now though, because after this week I'm going to have a few weeks worth of break time, and in that time I am probably going to be putting together a new prototype and should have an opportunity or two to playtest it.

No, not Michigan. Though I still have ideas on the board for Michigan the new map will be a re-realization of the split level engines used in Montreal combined with a number of other thematic rules.

The setting?

The Soviet Union.

Initial map drawings and early session reports hopefully will follow later this month.

CCCP-For-Web.jpg

Edit: Well, here's the initial draw of the map at least. I know what you're thinking...so many towns, it will be easy, perhaps too easy to make money? Think again...towns are not necessarily your friends in this expansion :-)
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14 novembre 2007 3 14 /11 /novembre /2007 17:36
Cette apres midi, je n'avais trop envie de me mettre dans mes copies et comme ludovic faisait le malin sur les forums du monde entier avec la nouvelle carte en solo d'age of steam, j'ai été contrainds d'ouvrir l'une de mes boites pour voir de quoi il retournait...
On choisit ici l'option la plus facile pour se chauffer avec 5 cubes noirs et 17 cubes rouges
Mise en place :


Les cubes noirs pénalisent le score de 10 points chacun, autant dire qu'il faut les transporter...

007.JPG

A la mise en place, les cubes noirs à l'extrémité ouest de la carte me font un peu peur. Tranporter des noirs, c'est se gacher des revenus, d'où tension....
Sans compter que l'action locomotive coute 5$. Je ne choisierai jamais de payer 5$ pour prendre ingénieur, n'en voyant pas l'utilité par rapport à l'action locomotive

Au tour 1, je prends 2 titres, achete une locomotive et paie 13$ en construction, je fais deux déplacements rouges à 2 et je dois 2 dollars à la banque. Je choisis l'option construction et locomotive en meme temps, c'est risqué, mais ca rapporte un double 2, ce qui dans le jeu à plusieurs est très puissant. For de cet expérience, je ne m'en prive pas ici, on verra bien....


Au tour deux, je m'inquiete en me disant que je dois continuer mes voies, mais j'oublie que je joue tout seul et qu'il n'est pas nécessaire ici de lutter...., je ne prends pas de loco, j'émets deux titres supplémentaires, paie 10$ en construction, fais deux déplacements rouges et me retrouvent à 8 sur l'échelle des income, et un équilibre assez facile . J'ai peur quand meme que mes titres me portent préjudice à la fin de la partie, surtout que j'ai pas mal de montagnes à traverser, mais bon... A noter que je néglige pour ces deux premiers tours les cubes noirs, ce qui est nécessaire, vue ma position sur les titres et que j'ai absolument besoin de revenir à l'équilibre vite.
CONSTRUCTION :
010.JPG
DEPLACEMENT :


Au tour 3, j'émets 2 nouveaux titres , je n'achete pas de locomotive et ne peux dépenser que 6$ en construction, je déplace encore deux cubes rouges afin de gagner des sous cette fois, je me place pour être capable de déplacer les cubes noirs au noir plus tard (sans doute au prochain tour.)
CONSTRUCTION :
013.JPG

DEPLACEMENT:
014.JPG

Au tour 4, j'émet encore deux nouveaux titres (ca commence sincérement à m'inquiéter, mais j'étais bénéficiaire au tour précédent, c'est juste que mon score final va en patir grave...
J'achète une autre locomotive et construit pour 11$, je me retrouve à gagner 3$ grace à deux déplacements de rouge à 3 chacun. Je n'ai toujours pas au tour 4 déplacer un seul cube noir... mais je suis bien placé pour le faire, je me focalise sur les gains pour l'instant...
A noter que je n'ai pas assez d'argent pour construire directement une voie complexe afin de pouvoir relier le nord de l'ile à partir de la ville au bord sur de la carte et celà me contrit séverement... Je n'aurai pas du construire au tour 1 la tuile complexe qui m'a couté 4$ , mais une de 3$ . Cette petit liaison ne me servira pas de la partie....
015.JPG

016.JPG

Au tour 5, j'émets seulement un titre, je n'achete pas de locomotive, et je construits plein sud pour 6$.


017.JPG

Je regrette encore cette tuile complexe qui m'aurait bien faciliter la tache pour rejoindre la ville au centre.. Je devrais la remplacer perdant ainsi des dollars et aussi une tuile de construction si je l'avais construit directement..
On arrive au milieu de la partie, j'en profite pour transporter mon premier cube noir qui ne me rapporte absolument rien ! je stagne donc dans le revenu, et touche 3$

018.JPG

Au tour 6, j'émets 2 titres, achete ma 4ième locomotive et construit pour 10$ vers cette fameuse ville au centre de la carte....
Je ferrai ainsi deux déplcament à 4 avec ces deux cubes rouges


Ma position sur l'échelle des scores avant réduction



Au tour 7, j'achete ma derniere locomotive de la partie en éméttant mon dernier titre, je construits pour 6$ pour relier le nord de l'ile
022.JPG

J'ai pu relier le nord de l'ile, pas par la liaison qui était prévue au départ, mais en faisant le tour au centre .
Grace à ces deux déplacements à 5 chacun , j'empoche un bénéfice de 11$
023.JPG



J'adore les macros ...

Au tour 8, pas de locomotive, ni de titres, je construits pour 9$ et relie le bord ouest de la carte et les deux fameux cubes noirs qui m'inquietaient en début de partie...

026.JPG

027.JPG
Je ne transporte pas ces cubes noirs pour ce tour , mais me débarasse des cubes noirs qui étaient pres de la capitale

028.JPGMes bénéfices tombent à 7$ à cause de ces cubes noirs....

Au tour 9, aucune loco, aucun titre, je construit pour 8$ et ainsi relier les deux derniers cubes rouges que je transporterai de la partie, encore deux cubes à 5 qui me permettent d'empocher 17$ à l'avant dernier tour. Mais je vais reculer grave sur l'échelle au tour suivant... A noter que les deux cubes rouges plus au dessus ne pourront pas être transporté. Je construits quand même pour faire des points de voies... Je terminerai ma boucle au tour suivant

029.JPG

Le mur de cubes rouges après déplacements...
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Ma position à l'issue du tour 9 et avant la réduction de -6 pour ce tour


Au tour 10, pas de titre, pas de loco, pas d'ingénieur évidement mais je construits pour 9$ quand meme et recoit un revenu de 10$

032.JPG

Aucun revenu pour ce tour, et ca fait mal , je recule encore mon pion de 4 cases cette fois pour atteindre 25

Le détail de mon score....

033.JPG

J'adore cette carte, quel challenge modulable en plus, vivement la prochaine partie et c'est en plus hyper addictif, surtout si on commence à se lancer des défis par internet.....








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2 novembre 2007 5 02 /11 /novembre /2007 10:37

My team of testers are more than only testers for my ideas to expand Age of Steam. They help me to developp what coule be a simply good idea into a tremendous idea (specially in New york in the building phase, in the moon to improve the black side system and edges to edges connection, in Egypt to developp the felluca action and the Nile Floodings and in many future ideas that are not actually on the blog.. be patient)
This time ,Brice, (a future mathematics teacher as I am) has the first a big big idea about schedule and trains.And i bet that we can developp this map till printing and selling in ESSEN as our future hit. The map is actuality in the computer, too big (a square of 70cm) but could remind some of moon ideas (not edges connections).... Have a look an try to imagine..
001.JPG

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1 novembre 2007 4 01 /11 /novembre /2007 20:05

I am always exited when i open the caracteristic boxes of the winsome games particularly when they contain a new expansion for my favorite game : Age of Steam (Did i tell you that i find  my forth copy of the basic game last week for 35e ?...)
This expansion is a three player map ...
I read the rules of this new map as soon as i get it (two hours after i bought the sets from J. Bohrer in ESSEN...) and i was surprised that straight lines cost $10 and curve lines cost only $3. CIties are very closed from each others but you have to spend $10  to connect directly two cities or $6 to connect with two curve lines... interesting...
More over, Winsome games have improved their design with green plain hexes and colored cities.

overview-of-the-fourth-turn.jpg
So a very expensive map and a very clever cost system with only 6 cities. We supposed that the forth city was purple, but it was not clear at first glance. So we add a purple disc on it.

Yellow-purple-domination.jpg


We understood the rules that we could build an incomplete curve line and the next turn, we can redirect in a straight line for the cost of a redirection $3$, but it is not clear that's probably why we did not run out from curve lines.


We understood that connecting a town costs 0$, but it was not clear for our poor english, never mind, all players have played the same game, with the same rules... ;-)

fin-de-partie-2.jpg

The game ends in turn 8 instead of turn 10

pawn.jpg
A flipping view of Pittsburgh...

renversant.jpg

Six cities,but many dices for each of them because we fill up the entire good supply.

fourth-turn.jpg
The last turn, with only 6 cubes

fin-de-partie.jpg
We did not undersand the background of the map (bridges, tunnels...)   Pittsburgh is for us a kind of flatland....

flatland.jpg


Nice game, with many questions about how to build, and to connect, how to use engineer .
Tought decisions with the special action urbanization  and a hightinteractive map with many possibilities of blocking players... some killing actions when you build an incomplete line and no possilities to reach the cityi in the next turn
no on chooses the new action that reduces the building costs of straight lines... but we played as newbies this afternoon.. tired by too many tests of other maps

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26 septembre 2007 3 26 /09 /septembre /2007 04:42
Tonnes of Age of Steam play last weekend for me, as I visited both of my old gaming groups on the west side of Michigan. I don't have the energy for full session reports, but here are my thoughts on the three new to me maps that hit the table in the order in which they were played.

New York Subway

I was thrilled to get this map onto the table for the first time. The complete overhaul of the system here includes virtual track routes based on subway stations and goods which are actually the player disks stacked into skyscraper formation. We played the map with 4, and the basic flow of the game saw two of us playing in our own parts of the map, and two others fighting from the get-go. By about mid-game, 3 of us were connected together into a big, fat tunnel and one other player was still relatively isolated. Sean, one of the players who was in constant competition throughout the game, ended up winning by 1 income over me.

I like the map, and I think the changes are neat, but I think they make maximum length deliveries a little too easy. As long as you build a fat tunnel, and are sure to place two stations on each skyscraper (city), it is easy to make maximum length shipments. In the early game, I set up in a small area, and simply moved goods of complimentary colours back and forth between a few skyscrapers while I built up my infrastructure.

In fairness, I think this map would probably best best with 5 or 6, and we played it with 4. Neat though, very interesting changes.


Mississippi Steamboats

This was one I had had lying around for a while, and I finally got it to the table with 4, including a newbie (Ted has said that he thinks this is a good learning map). From the get-go, I found the central mechanic, the "steamboats", to be irksome to an annoyingly high degree.

For those who aren't familiar, the board is long and skinny, and is divided by a river. When you urbanize, you put the city on the river, and it moves up and down at the end of each round based on dice rolls. Unfortunately, the colours are set up on the board to create shortages on each side of the river, and the only way to get across is to have a steamboat sitting there with two docks on either side of it. In other words, there is no predictable way to bridge the river, and there is no predicatable way to ensure the city you want is going to be in the area when you want it.

I found the map maddeningly random, and as much as I've enjoyed Ted's other maps, I felt this one was a huge whiff, it's easily my least favourite AoS expansion.


War in Iraq

At the end of a long day of gaming, a few of us still had enough energy to pull this map out. The primary flavour in Iraq comes from the lucrative oil field hexes, which are loaded up with black cubes at the start of the game. These can be delivered to the black cities if they are urbanized, but they can more profitably be sent to the EU/US, in which case they are kept in front of the player shipping them for an end-game scoring bonus.

I liked this map, and I found that even with 3 the competition was very tough. Using the veteran rules, we only were rolling 2 dice for goods growth, and the map ended up with only 5 goods on it (and this was with above average rolls for the oil fields prior to the game!).

Of the "high value goods drive map decisions" expansions, I consider this solid, a slight step below Alspach's PA, and a slight step above Mars. The only really soft thing here is the auction, because there are so many goods roles to choose from, but there were still some high bids and tense moments because sometimes players couldn't be sure what the other person wanted, and had to bid high for security.


Overall, a most enjoyable, AoS heavy weekend :-)
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13 septembre 2007 4 13 /09 /septembre /2007 01:34

Not much Age of Steam news for me to talk about recently, as I've been busy doing school work (i.e.: teaching 4 discussion sections here at Michigan State and reading 3 books a week for my own work) but I did find time to participate in a podcast with the Metagamers specifically about Age of Steam.

The direct link is here:

TheMetagamers_Episode12

In the show we mainly discuss basic Age of Steam principals / strategy, which is probably old hat for most of the people reading, but there you have it.

In random other news, I'm nearly ready to do up a prototype map for Michigan again, though it's hard to say when that will actually happen. I'm also pleased to hear that John Bohrer is going  to release another pair of AoS maps this Essen, including another 3 player one, based in my favourite US city, Pittsburgh. The Southern US also sounds interesting, as it will feature 14 white goods cubes (cotton), and I'm intrigued to see how that will work. I have to admit, I'll probably be tempted to use both the white cubes from the Southern US with the green cubes from NY Subway to create a super AoS fan variant at some point :-)

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11 septembre 2007 2 11 /09 /septembre /2007 21:00

After one dozen games of my new Egypt expansion, some elements can be fixed up.
First i thought that two pyramids of 14 cubes was too many goods on the board for a setting phase. If you add 12 cities with 2 cubes , there will be more than 28+24 = 52!! cubes at the beginning of the game.
But in fact, because of the Nile floods, only one pyramid and only the cubes on the top (a kind of NYC subway idea...) can be transported. One city is flooding each turn, two more cubes that can not be transported....
When there is still left one cube on the second level of the pyramid, it is dangerous to transport the last cube, because next player will have 9 cubes to transport. It is even more important if you imagine that it can occur at the end of the game. Only one yellow city in the Nile delta that is very difficult to link because always bordered by flood hexes. We fixe the price of the Suez Canal at $8 to link a rainbow city....

The Nile idea is a very good idea, not only because it is mine, but also because it adds plenty of different strategies. If you first build on one side of the Nile, we will never have problem with crossing the water, so you don't have to try to have the felluca action, and your development in the game is easy to plan. But at the end of the game, (the last 3 turn usually), the lack of goods, and the very dense network in the center of the board will oblig you to cross the Nile or if it is always possible to link the second pyramid. It seems to be fundamental to link one pyramid. If you first build on two sides of the nile, it will be very expensive.

Engineer will be very usefull , and you should build 4 hexes at each time you get this action (at half cost , remember...)
The price difference between the desert $3 and all plain hexes that border the nile is also very intersting and if you think that $3 is not very expensive, you can trust me, on this map 3$ is very very expensive. 15 shares occur very often for our very experimented group, and 1 or 2 players usually move down during the 5 first turns!!! We probably neglige the power of the felluca action that can collect $1 per blue disc if one player cross flooding hexes...

I think that moon fans wouldn't be so much surprise by this new map. Mecanism is different, but the map is swich into two parts by the Nile. If you want to cross, engineer for the building phase and felluca for the delivery phase should be a good choice. And if you could get the locomotive.. arffffff, we can only choose one action...  
Future Nyc subway fans will recognize with the stack of cubes this time what is waking up myself each night..... stacking cubes with order ;-)))))

I hope to play more often in Egypt and relat one future session report..


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17 août 2007 5 17 /08 /août /2007 23:44
I had the pleasure of playing the Spain map by the Steam Brothers last night with my regular play group, this being the last session prior to my move up to East Lansing, after which my AoS playtime is going to be greatly diminished.

For those who aren't familiar with the map, Spain's main features include its New City seeding (i.e.: all of the New City tiles except for the blue one are randomly placed on the board with the aid of a 12 sided die prior to the start of the game), the Insurrection action (which removes the New City tiles, destroys the goods present, and makes the city effectively colourless), and the team based play.

The initial city rolls placed most of the cities in the south, leaving the north quite barren. The colour placements were particularly irksome, as the colours were clustered together, making longer deliveries more difficult.

The teams were myself and Alex versus Sean and Jesse. The basic strategies that each team used were different. Sean and Jesse built their networks together from the start of the game, gathering their strength in the SE portion of the board. Alex started working in the west, which in the abstract, appeared to be the strongest area of the board because of the goods. I built north of Sean and Jesse, attempting to interfere with their access to the blue cities in the NE, and hoping to link up with Alex later in the game.

In the early going, Jesse and Sean seemed to play a fairly balanced strategy. Neither of them was issuing more shares than the other, and they were helping each other when it was convenient. On our team, I was issuing shares aggressively to finance my track building, while Alex was keeping his total down. Both teams were regularly using each other's track to facilitate maximum income and strength, and there was a lot of negotiation and discussion going on about track builds and goods shipments.

I think it's important to note here that in the rules, the scoring for this works as follows: sum the team incomes, the team with the highest sum finishes first and second based on their individual scores. We seemed to completely eschew that 1st/2nd distinction though, and were playing the map purely for team sums, which brought out some unique dynamics (I think largely because our group has a play for 1st mentality, and the team play doesn't seem to work well unless the team score actually IS what matters).

The story of the map basically was that Jesse and Sean were able to get ahead on the Locomotive track by being able to win the role, and by the mid-game they had enough money to repeatedly take the role to deny it to our team. Their networks also ended up being more effective, as they set up combined circle routes earlier, and were able to run big routes continuously in the late game. In retrospect, I probably should have advised my partner to issue more shares (he finished a few behind the other guys) to go after the role more aggressively, because it would have easily added on several income to our combined final score.The Sean / Jesse team prevailed in a landslide because of their engine superiority.

I think my final thought was that I liked the idea here, and I wouldn't mind playing the map again, but the team play seemed to add a huge amount of length to the game. This was not nearly as apparent in the other team map that we played, Golden Spike. I don't know if that was just because GS has a more restricted board and fewer options (probably is a huge part of it), or if it was just the pure team mentality that we were using, but Spain dragged a bit, and lasted much longer than a normal 4 player game does for our group.

I think I would be much more likely to play this map again in the future with solo scoring (no teams) simply because I like the Insurrection idea and the New City seeding, but found that the amount of time that the team play added to the mix was just too much.

As a solo game the map would be very nasty indeed though. Locomotive is so far better than anything else in the auction that inflation would probably be a major factor. Insurrection is useful, but not in the way that one would think. In our game it was being used much more often on cities within our own networks to clear the path than it was offensively. Some of this might have been because of the way the New City tiles were rolled out, but in any case, I found the role less powerful than Urb, and while it is interesting, and I like the reverse flow (i.e.: fewer cities as the game goes, destruction of goods) I didn't find the role to be particularly powerful either. Perhaps more plays would change my mind.

On a final final note, like most of the Steam Brothers maps, the scale on this is a minimum 4, and it would probably be at its best with 5. The map is just big, and there are a lot of goods to go around. Insurrection also means that it is easier to make cubes in bad locations useful.
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10 août 2007 5 10 /08 /août /2007 12:00

Yesterday, we travelled Egypt for the second time. My favorit players , Brice, Guillaume , Mathieu were at home for a good cause : adjust the first rules of this expansion...
My first idea is to flood the left side of the Nile in the first turn, the right side of the Nile in the second turn, the left side of the Niel in the third turn and so on...
My second idea is to pill cubes as pyramid with 14 cubes and my last idea is about the Suez canal.
The first problem is to design the Nile and to size the first map. When there is a Nile flood, we just place a blue disc on the left of the hex. 
021-copie.jpg

But if i draw a river like in the other expansion, in the middle of a given hex, there will be potentially three hexes impassable....one for the river, one on the left side, and one on the right side....Too much.
For the first time in all expansions that i know , i drew a river on the edge of the hexes. In my first map, i designed the Nile quite in the right of the map and when i tested it alone, it was too desequilibrate.
The second and the third map in color !!
001.jpg002-copie.jpg

I designed again a new map for our real tests of Thursday.

In the delta of the Nile, i place the only yellow city which is bordered by the Nile on the left and right side.. so very difficult to deliver goods. One City will be rainbow on the left side near the mediteranean sea, and the two hexes below can only be build in the third turn for $5 each with black lines... (The Suez Canal)
In my first ideas, the Engineer allows building on flood hexes and allows to deliver cubes throught water hexes... But it was too powerfull. I split the power of the Engineer actions into two actions... 
- Engineer would be the only one who can build on the Nile Flood a
- and another action that would replaced Production and allowed a player to deliver cubes throught the Nile Flood = throught blue discs..... 

But one hour before the first tests, i thought it would be too difficult to cross the Nile : You had to choose the Enginneer to build and the other action that called
Felluca to deliver goods throught blue disc... too difficult... 

So Enginneer would reduce the costs of flood hexes to $2 only. So every player can build everywhere. Desert will cost $3, plains without blue disc will cost $2, and plains with blue disc $4, but only $2 with the engineer..

Brice noticed that Felluca would be a very powerfull action before the setting of the game... He is right and we increase the power of the engineer : 4 tracks at half cost !!!, Felluca always allows a player to pass throught blue disc.

003.jpg

There was many comments about the Felluca action. 
Can we deliver a cube in a flood city (with a blue disc on it)? Can we pick up a cube in a city with a blue disc, in a pyramid?
We do a compromise of all these ideas : Felluca allows a player to pass throught a blue disc and to deliver a cube in a flood city, but ...never allows to pick up a cube in a pyramid and city with a blue disc on it.
Pyramid is not considered as a city and we do not build pyramids in this expansion, we just pick up cubes from the pyramid to deliver in cities. We can not pass throught a pyramid with cubes...

005.jpg
There are two pyramids with 14 cubes each + 13 cities (two cities with three cubes).. 28 + 28 cubes...= 56 cubes on the setting phase of the game, probably too much, but some of them can not be delivered because there is a blue disc on them.. I place the 40 remaining cubes in the production chart with only 2 cubes on each row (instead of three), no more cubes in the bag...great i have never lost one cube during our tests... ;-) incredible!!
The urbanization action is not changed...
007-copie.jpg

So we begin to play after one hour of comments.... and adjusting my first rules with very experimented players (more than 50 games each...)
008.jpg
We had a very good time playing this map, but few things have to be changed...
Firstable, the Suez Canal is too powerfull for the player who build it with the rainbow city...
Second, the yellox city in the delta of the Nile is very difficult to link and to deliver goods
Stacking 28 cubes in two pyramids worked very very well because it is not allowed to pick up cubes from the pyramids with there is a Nile Flood.

009.jpg

The Enginneer action is very powerfull and contre balance very well the Locomotive action, the urbanization and the Felluca action.
In our next tests, i will colored the city in the delta in rainbow and the city in the Suez Canal in Yellow, I will probably allow the construction of the Suez Canal for many players.
Probably the green city (rainbow) will only be red, purple yellow and blue but not black!
A new idea comes at the end of the game... We have to pay to the Felluca player or to the bank to cross throught blue disc (probably $2 for each blue disc crossed)
We will test two times this new ideas on Thursday afternoon...
 

010.jpg

Except the red player (Mathieu) we have all borrow 15 shares...

011-copie.jpg

And the final turn...

012.jpg



We have had the proof that this map would be perfect for 3 to 5 players, 5 will be a killing game....

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7 août 2007 2 07 /08 /août /2007 18:56
The design bug bit me again in the shower yesterday, so I did some more preliminary design ideas for Michigan, and I'm at the point now where I might do a rough draw of the map up and start toying with the mathematical design of the map and expenses. I thought I had a rough map around here, but it seems to have completely disappeared, which means I am going to have to dig deeper into the paper piles, or completely redraw it...otherwise I would have attached a VERY rough draw to this post.

In any case, in the initial draw, Cities on the map will have coloured squares to denote what they can Produce. Their primary (normal) colour will be what they accept during delivery.

Goods Growth phase will be like Australian Railways, each player will draw a cube (a couple, a few) from the bag, and place 1 on any legal spot on the map, the legal spots being denoted by the production colour squares.

Before the Growth phase, but only in the late rounds (say, 7+, game being 10 rounds) there will be a check for Blight. An area becomes Blighted if it only has 1 (or 0) good(s) remaining. In that case, that remaining good is removed, and a neutral player stone is placed on top of the city. It no longer can produce goods, it can no longer accept goods, and any good that passes through it during delivery is worth 1 less income.

I am strongly considering unique New City tiles, otherwise, I will make the New City tiles only accept goods.

I anticipate that Blight will make the end game rather nasty indeed, as making income would suddenly become insanely difficult, particularly if paired with the accelerated expenses idea. I might just work with Blight alone before trying to add more expenses on top of it. My guess is that Blight will create tendencies for players to load up distant Cities with their production, hence trying to protect themselves for the late game. The southern portion of the board will thus, start out lucrative (more goods at the start of the game) but will likely die by the late game because the goods will be missing and it will become Blighted, and hence, very difficult to ship through at a profit.

If Blight ends up becoming too nasty, it could always be mildly toned down a bit...for instance, cities that are Blighted could still accept goods, and the -1 income hit could only be something that hits a cube once, when it is delivered to a Blighted city, rather than leeching income each time a good passes through.

As an addendum: Chicago and Green Bay will never be subject to Blight. Green Bay will be served only via a Ferry Line from Ludington. Chicago will have a ship line connected to it from the UP, but will also be reachable with track.
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