Alternate USA

[RayofSunshine]

It has been some time since I played this scenario, considering that it is the first scenario on the list of RRT3. Had a lot of fun with the challenge, but was not very successful getting any medals. I alienated FLA and the Great Lakes Feds, in a vote, and was only able to get their Strained level to just Neuteral, even though I was running a constanct supply of grain to GLF and milk to FLA. However, after reading some of the strategies of the previous players, I have will try to use a different approach or system on my next attempt.

[HurstLlama]

I have been struggling with this scenario for a while now, but I have hit a problem that I can't work out - trains eternally waiting for cargo.

For example I have a train at a station in which there is 8.2 loads of corn, the train has a consist of a minimum of 1 unit and a maximum of 6 of corn and a destination where is corn is wanted and the price is higher than the originating station. Yet the train does not load up, it just sits there for year on year "Waiting for more cargo".

Can anyone shed any light on this?

[Wolverine@MSU]

Are you using a Custom Consist or Automatic Loading with corn as the cargo? Are you playing in 1.05 or 1.06? When using Automatic Consist or playing in 1.05 (even for Custom Consist) the destination price must be at least $2 more than the origin price.

[j484fan]

Okay, I have my questions to throw into this mix. I am playing on 1.05 and have been trying Penn Minutemans method. In trying to send grain to Texhoma, I am able to send two trainloads of grain then after that, the demand/profit drops too low for me to send. This is even with building and soon after upgrading a distillery in both Oklahoma City and Tulsa. Also, I don't seem to make the tons of money in the great plains as soon, as what I gather others have made. I don't do poorly, but also, there is no indication how many years of play in these player strategies how long it took them from each stage to the next, so not sure if I may be going from one to the other too quickly or what I may be doing wrong.

Also seems I may want to try buying a few milk farms and cattle ranches to start out with, as for quite a few of the early years, I move a ton of milk and cattle between Omaha, Liberal and Kansas City.

I also forgot to add, that for whatever reason, I don't seem to get the grain movement to Wichita when I build a distillery there.

[BikerTim]

I just got my first ever gold medal on this one. I think the only comment I can make is "never give up"!

[Cliff]

Tell us how you get on. I presume you switched to 1.05? Even so, I think you might find the problem is keeping profitable and therefore not losing control of your company, which I did several times. That particular hazard is even worse in 1.06, where if you're not careful you'll have 200 of your 270 trains running at a loss and then wonder why the shareholders don't like you!

Hi y'all -

I know that nobody has played this scenario for years & years, but I thought I'd give it a try since I've completed all the other CtC scenarios recently. I did manage to get gold on expert with Alternate USA many years ago when CtC first came out. So, anyway, the game progressed pretty straight-forward, tho I made a mistake in buying steam engines for the mountains while continuing to use the electric engines elsewhere. Turns out the steam engines racked up much more maintenance & fuel costs. I managed to complete all the goals by 1944 (excellent relations with all nine of the countries which now make up the USA). But my bottom line was struggling and the profit per share was less than $2.00 because I had issued so much stock (over 3 million shares last time I looked). With the main goals completed I could retire a few of the unprofitable trains, and even bought back a few hundred thousand shares of stock, but the shareholders became increasingly unahppy. In 1945 we entered one of the L-O-N-G Recession-Depression cycles, and I got my one-year notice in Jan 1946 -- got my walking papers in Jan 1947. Dang! Well, I just let it run on very fast for the next 4 years 'til the end of 1950 when -- lo & behold! -- it gave me the Expert Gold! (even though I no longer controlled the danged RR company)

[RulerofRails]

I know that nobody has played this scenario for years & years,

I have played it about a year ago, when I had the opportunity to get back into the game and not long before I signed up here. This scenario isn't really that tight on the time limit, and with nice precise management getting the hauls is pretty easy. My main strategy last time was to keep things clean and simple. Also to make sure finances are strong before spending good money on the haul goals which will at best likely be break-even. Wherever possible (except for the Corn requirement) I built up enough factories in one square of a city within each territory that would consume the total requirement I needed to deliver every year. Also a little extra capacity as I slightly oversupplied in case of break-downs or other disruptions. This also helped re-coup the transport costs as I got profit from these industries. I was surprised at how easy it was using this strategy as I had been overwhelmed by it the first time I ever played it as I thought that since it was "SUPER HARD" micro-managing would be required. I made a paper list to try to count the loads, pausing after every train arrived and ending up with a real mess as I neglected making money so finances were poor as well. When I found out that the medal wont fire before 1950 I realized how stupid this was . The medal is awarded simply on the basis that it is 1950 and that the territory relations are all EXCELLENT.

[traindriver]

it is a very difficult balancing map.

[AT41B]

This is ONE of my favorite scenarios. I like it to change my thoughts from the scenario I am attempting to write.
the scenario I am working on is a TM game, soon to be put out for additional help on some of the problems I am having. But, back to Alternate USA.
I do find it very challenging. I have not made a good score with it, YET.