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18Tokaido
- Designed by Douglas Triggs
- Unpublished
- Rules (not available yet, but see notes below)
- Map
- Tiles
- Market
These are the main differences from a "standard" 18xx game:
- Starts with snake draft instead of waterfall; any remaining private companies are discarded if all players pass (it might take two passes for some players to give every player a chance to do so).
- There are seven railroad corporations are in the game, but in a two or three player game, one of them is removed. The Yokohama-Shinbashi Line is always in the game.
- First stock round is in reverse order of draft, then standard priority (start with the first person after the last person to take an action).
- D trains are the same as E trains in 1830-style games, but diesels were never a thing in Japan (outside of Hokkaido). Electric trains were.
- Trains export after every set of ORs including first E train if one has not yet been purchased by a corporation.
- Game ends either in bankruptcy or 3 ORs after first E train comes out. If the E train is exported, game ends after next set of ORs. If the E train is purchased by a corporation, a stock round will happen first, then one last set of ORs.
Variants:
- Pass Priority: order of next stock round in order of passing in previous stock round (only for three or more players where it would matter).
- No Discard: play with all seven railroad corporations instead of discarding one (for three or fewer players where a corporation would normally be discarded).
- Limited Express: play with one less 6 train for a faster, meaner game.
18 Tokaido is primarily designed to be used for 3-player teaches on 18xx.games, but supports 2 or 4 players. It's mostly a straightforward game in the 1830 tree with a few ideas from 18Chesapeake and other places, but meant to be lighter and faster than 18Chesapeake so more fit for teaching at three players. Overriding design goals are a game that's (1) straightforward, (2) small, and (3) fast. "Gentle," however, is not one of the design goals; if anything the game might be a bit on the mean side. I believe if you're teaching the game (interactively, anyway), mean games are good, since you can point out all the land mines as players are exposed to them and they can directly experience how they work.
- Snake draft because it's (1) fast, (2) easy to understand, and (3) I like snake drafts.
- Sell-then-buy only, no yellow zone, and a flat-ish market limit stock shenanigans to the most essential ones.
- Fairly simple privates with easy-to-grasp implications, six railroads for ideal two-railroads-per-player at a 3-person player count for exposure to essential train shenanigans.
- Export plus ending on the E train ensures a train rush which is an essential part of the vast majority of 18xx games, and moves things along for beginners. Low train count to ensure that the game goes fairly quickly.
- Relatively small map and low token count, but lots of interesting geographical constraints that make tokening important. Terrain is relatively cheap, though, and payouts are relatively good in the urban clusters, so money isn't too hard to come by. E trains are limited by the choke points, but lots of towns and careful tokening can still make them pay very well — but there are no guarantees they're worth it.
- Tiles are limited but not punishingly so. Might have to replace a tile to free something up, but not a big part of the game.
- Cheaper E trains make the game a little more forgiving with the relatively fast train rush.
- No special two player rules; if meant for teaching, stick with the same rules so they learn the standard game, even at the expense of balance.
- In the end, mostly a standard 18xx game: standard stock movement, full cap at 60% float, mostly standard trains (but cheaper D/E trains like 18Chesapeake), standard phases, mostly standard train limits, standard 1-tile lay, mostly standard tiles, etc., etc.
The theme is Japan because I like it (and because I lived there; I've ridden trains around most of the map). The topic/name Tokaido is because that's the busiest and most important line in Japan (and possibly the world) with deep historical roots, and so the map is centered on the Tokaido Line (it's not all of Japan, it's not even all of Honshu, it's also bigger than just Kansai or Kanto or Chubu).
The game is mostly fairly accurate historically, I believe all of the train companies existed (with the exception of the Yokohama-Shinbashi Line I'll talk about below), though the Nanao wasn't very important, and the Aichi Railway Co. is a strange case: the modern Nagoya Railway Co. ("Meitetsu") came later, but it traces its roots back to the Aichi Horsecar Co. during this period (I more or less split the difference). But also ARC worked better than having two NRCs. The Yokohama-Shinbashi Line was not a private company, of course, it represents the original line in Japan (and I used the Keihin characters for the symbol because the modern Keihin line covers the same route). But a lot of early railroad development in Japan wasn't private, and most of the companies in the game were created both after 1885 (more than ten years after government lines started being built) and were nationalized by 1907. Inoue Masaru was, of course, very important, and the Sasago Tunnel was one of the longest early tunnels in Japan (it remained the longest until 1931, I believe), although it's unfortunate that it shares a name with a highway tunnel that might be better known because of a collapse that resulted in the deadliest roadway accident in Japanese history (I've considered changing that for that reason). The Kyoto Railway Co. was minor but was acquired by the Kansai Railway Co. fairly quickly, so I thought it was a good choice for a "blocker" where it is on the map.
Stationmaster Tama, though? Well, games ought to be able to have fun sometimes.
Unfortunately, other than the map and entities, there's not a lot of theme specific to the setting, which is a shame. Railway development in Japan was pretty unique and the rules don't really capture any of that.
Still a prototype, playtesting will almost certainly lead to changes. Feedback appreciated.