Rail Baron
GAME COMPONENTS
Mapboard of the United States
Rulebook and Destination Chart
Payoff Chart
28 Rail Line Title Cards
6 Express Title Cards
6 Superchief Title Cards
6 Sets of colored tokens, each set having one pawn and two matching chips.
2 white dice and 1 colored die
Play Money
THE MAPBOARD
The mapboard portrays the 28 major rail lines and the major cities they connected in the United States during the great days of railroading. Each rail line company is represented by its own distinctive set of lines, running from dot to dot; the Pennsylvania RR is represented by reddish sawtooth lines, for example. The players move by moving their pawns along these rail lines from dot to dot.
The square “dots” represent the major cities where the players start and end their trips (the paired squares, Oakland-San Francisco and Minneapolis-St. Paul, represent twin cities – each pair is counted as one city in the game).
The round dots are smaller towns and the rail junctions that the players use for movement. Each player rolls the dice and moves the number of dots he rolls.
The board has been divided into seven “regions” (labeled NORTHEAST to SOUTH-WEST), each tinted a different color.
STARTING THE GAME
At the start of the game, each player is given $20,000 in cash, and one pawn and two chips of the same color. The pawn is his “Train” that he will move from dot to dot; the chips are used to keep track of the city that he starts each trip from and the destination city that he is heading for. All the Title Cards and the remaining money are placed in the Bank.
The players roll to see who will go first, the high roller staring the game. Play proceeds to each player’s left, clockwise around the board.
Before the start of play each player rolls twice and consults the DESTINATION TABLE to determine the region and city where he will start the game (see ROLLING FOR DESTINATIONS, below). This city is his “home city” for...