Russian Railroads: American Railroads — Being industrious and dabbling in stocks

I recently played my new copy of Russian Railroads: American Railroads that I picked up recently at BGG Con.  I’ve had the base game Russian Railroads for a few years, and while I always enjoy playing it, the game’s winner, for the most part, is determined by who advances the most on the Trans-Siberian railroad.

With American Railroads, that is no longer the case. This mini-expansion is great! It makes the original better, and I really like the new added mechanics, which allow different ways to score. I won’t be going over how to play the original Russian Railroads here, but I think I’d like to revisit how to play that game in a future post.

Russian Railroads: American Railroads comes with 4 new player boards, two new bonus tokens, two boulders, and a stock-market side board. The different railroads are laid out a little bit differently, and there are not one, but two industry tracks! Because, ‘Merica!! The main action board is the same one from Russian Railroads.

The biggest element added to the game is the stock market. There are various locations on the player board that allow you to advance on the stock market, either by fulfilling requirements, or by fulfilling requirements and paying a dollar. When you’re the first player to advance to the next level of the market, you get to decide which bonus you and other players can receive. All future players who then move into that level will get that bonus. The bonuses are 5 victory points, a dollar (because ‘Merica!), industry-track advancements, a black-track advancement, and a track advancement of your choice.

There are also steelworks factories that trigger the stock market when the last 4, 6 and 8 locomotives are taken. That player then has the option to place the steelworks factory in their industry track, and then everybody gets a personal payout starting with the player who triggered it. A personal payout means you receive all the bonuses at your level on the stock market and below.  Also, if somebody reaches the top of the stock market, he or she also receives a personal payout. At the end of the game, the person highest on the market gets 20 points, and second gets 10 points.

On the player board, there are two giant boulders on the Transcontinental West and Transcontinental East tracks. You cannot advance on either track until you detonate them. Detonations are done on the top track, the Rocky Mountaineer. When you are able to detonate by fulfilling requirements, you pick one of your boulders and immediately score 10 victory points, and that track is now open. When you fulfill the requirements for the second detonation space, you then remove the other boulder and score 10 VPs, opening up that track as well.

Now the industry tracks. The top one is easier to advance as you can skip past the gaps where a factory would normally sit. If there is a factory in the spot, you have to use the factory’s function immediately. If you’re advancing on the bottom industry track, you can only advance past a gap if there’s a factory, like with the original game. When you take the industry  actions, you can split your movements between each track, but you cannot change tracks.

Lastly, two new bonus tokens are available for players to choose from. The first one is the Golden Spike, which gives you 25 points during the scoring phase for reaching the end of Transcontinental West and Transcontinental East tracks. The other bonus token allows you to get advance on the stock market and get a personal payout as well.

I ended up in 2nd place in our game; the winner of the game utilized the stock market actions and not the top track in this game. Russian Railroads: American Railroads is available at the BGG Con store. Can’t wait to play this game again!