Martian Rails

How to begin

1. Choose how many railroads are playing, two to six, and the temper of the opposition: cadet, veteran or ace.
2. Press Open the survey. If you have played before, Resume saved game picks up where you stopped.
3. You are dealt a home major city and 60 to open with. Spend the two survey turns laying grade out of it — toward the nearest other settlements you can work, not toward the biggest fee on your waybills.
4. When the survey closes your train is placed automatically, and normal turns begin.

Controls

What you are trying to do

You run a railroad company on Mars. You win by being the first to hold the charter figure in your treasury and have all five major cities — Chryse, Syrtis Major, Elysium, Olympus and Hellas — standing on one connected system.

The charter figure depends on how many railroads are playing: 230 for two, 250 for three, 270 for four, 290 for five, 310 for six. Running fees are real income, and a small field collects far less of them.

The one thing that makes this map different

The sheet is a cylinder, cut at 180° east. The eastern edge of the plate is the western edge. Grade laid up to the seam carries on from the far side, and so does a train.

Turn order

1. The first two turns are survey turns. You may lay grade but not run a train. These are taken in snake order — first seat to last, then last back to first — so nobody gets both opening picks.
2. When the survey closes, every railroad places its train on the largest city it has reached.
3. After that, each round every railroad takes one turn in seat order. On your turn you may lay up to 20 of new grade and move your train up to its allowance, in either order, going back and forth as you like.
4. At the top of your turn an event may fire. It lasts the round.
5. The charter is checked at the close of a round, never in the middle, so every railroad has had the same number of turns.

Laying grade

With Lay grade selected, click a milepost next to your existing system and the cheapest segment joining it is laid. Drag across mileposts to lay a run. Before you own any track you may start from any city milepost.

Crossing a barrier adds to the price: an outflow channel +2, a chasma +3, a dry canal +1, a wet canal +2. A lava tube runs beneath its barrier and adds nothing at all — the only free crossing on the planet, and worth planning a route around. Tubes are drawn as small verdigris rings.

U or Undo grade takes back the last segment you laid this turn and refunds it.

Movement

Switch to Run train and click any milepost your train can reach; it takes the shortest legal route and stops when the movement runs out. Each milepost entered costs one point of movement. The Dust Crawler you start with has 9.

You may run on your own grade, on the shared segments inside a major city (those belong to everybody, so nobody can be walled out of a major), and on a rival's grade for a fee of 4 — paid once to that railroad per turn, however far you run on it. You cannot enter track you cannot pay for.

Freight

You hold three waybills. Each names three demands: a commodity, the settlement that wants it, and the fee. Load a commodity free at any settlement that raises it, carry it to the settlement named, and collect. That waybill is discarded and a fresh one drawn.

Where to load

A demand tells you what is wanted and where. It does not tell you where to pick it up, and with 178 settlements on the plate that is the harder half of the question. So tap the demand.

If you are already carrying the load, the caption says so and marks only the destination. You can also hover any milepost to see what it raises.

If none of your three waybills can be worked, Return waybills swaps all three for new ones at the cost of the rest of the turn's running. Do this early rather than after four rounds of hoping.

A locomotive change costs 20, one per turn. The Maglev moves 16 and pulls three cars.

Scoring

There is no combat in this game and no victory points. The only score is the treasury, and it moves in five ways:

The mail contract tops any railroad up to 8 at the start of its turn so it can always move, but that money cannot be spent on grade.

Winning

Reach the charter figure with all five majors on one connected system, and survive to the close of the round. If more than one railroad qualifies in the same round, the richer treasury takes it.

Losing

There is no elimination and no bankruptcy — you lose by another railroad completing its charter first. The way that usually happens is that you lay grade until the treasury is empty and then cannot afford the running fee to reach the settlement that would have paid you. The government mail contract tops any railroad up to 8 at the start of its turn so it can always move, but that money is operating money and cannot be spent on grade. Keep a working reserve.

If a game somehow runs 250 rounds without a charter, the richest railroad takes it.

Saving and restarting

The game saves itself in your browser at the top of every turn, and Resume saved game on the opening screen picks it up. Starting a new survey replaces the saved game. When a game finishes, Open a new survey returns you to the opening screen, where you can change the number of railroads and the temper of the opposition. Reloading the page and resuming is always safe.

Keys