Birth of a Nation (campaign map CA01)

[nedfumpkin]

Yes...it's a typo I will fix it.

After many tries of different things...the key to surviving the first year is to lay your track like this.

St. Jean to La Prairie..Large Station at St. Jean, medium at La Prairie. This line won't make mony, but you need it the first year.

Next run a line from Montreal to Lachine, put a large station at Montreal, none at Lachine. Make sure your station is close to the brewery and encompasses the ports and machine shop.

Branch off to Chomedy and put a large station there. You can get a reasonable bridge if you put it in the right place.

Your first train should run from Chomedey to Montreal and have a load of lumber on it.

Depending on where the retail spawns, it can be either very tight or very very tight getting your 50k.

If you have enough for a third train, run it from Montreal to Chomedey. Give priority to the train carrying lumber to your brewery though.

After the loads are dumped, put your station at Lachine. Don't send any coal to Lachine though.

After the first year you can get two bonds, should be enough to buy the glass factory. Run one train bringing coal and sand to Lachine, returning with glass. You don't want it to make money in 1837or else it will be to expensive to buy in 1838.

This will get you on the way to enough in indstry profits.

Next connections are St. Jean to Chambly, Chamly to St. Lambert, then St. Jean to Odelltown. Do this before 1840 and a Textile mill appears near St. Lambrt. Buy it, and run textiles to the flour mill at Odelltown, buy it and you will have enough to support the C&STL after you go over to the GTR.

___________________

I'm still not sure what is causing the prices to go to the negative thousands, but since I was able to play on further in a previous version of the map, I am goingto put the seasons to how they were originally since something is causing the death spiral. Weird since the only effects to the price of coal is to increase it for a month during winter, however, its gone down to -$6700 when I crash.

[nedfumpkin]

Looks as though I found the problem....should work now...but I'll know tomorrow for sure when I can play further along. But so far everything seems to be working as it should.

Hint...after you gain access to Lower Canada with the GTR...cap all the ends for the C&STL tracks to limit expansion. Just put a few segments of your own track on the ends of the track you originally laid.



Edit...it's still crapping out but I think I may have the culprit now...gonna do some more tests.

[nedfumpkin]

So this should be it.

I played through and the goals are achievable. I'll be putting together a zip of campaign files that will include this map, but for now it's in the zip. I've painted it as best I can.

Just unzip all the files to their respective directories. Included is the logo for the St Lawrence & Atlantic RR, as well as an updated language file listing this map as the first campaign map.

Enjoy.

Update:

Files is now located here: download/file.php?id=1364

[Blackhawk]

Well I finally got around to playing this map. I thought I had played it awhile ago, but I guess I only played the start and never got around to finishing it.

It has been awhile since I last played a TM map as most of the maps I've played lately have been RT3 and RT3 1.06. I now remember how much more complex and micromanaging TM can be.

I think the hardest part of the map was the start in trying to make sure the brewery would make enough money. Oddly in one start no matter what I did I didn't seem able to make enough money at the brewery. Yet in another start I didn't have to do anything and the brewery made a profit on its own. After getting the brewery and glass factory and textile mill all up and running, I wasn't really sure where to go though on this map. The back ledger wasn't really much help in determining what to do next, so I just focused on expansion. Having played the original version of this map I remembered you have to make certain connections and eventually take over all the other companies as the Grand Trunk, so early on I worked to get stock in all the companies.

For a few years I was switching between the C&STL and GT. Usually I'd work on connections and train routes with the C&STL and then switch to the GT to build a couple industries in Upper Canada so they'd start making a profit, then switch back to the C&STL to continue expanding. [Paper mills, flour mills, textile mills, and furniture factories are all very easily supplied on this map and make large profits] The first couple times I switched companies I didn't actually have a majority in the C&STL, but I was lucky enough to be voted back in and I soon acquired a majority, and used the company to buy up any outstanding shares. Eventually I built up to Cornwall with the GT to get access to Lower Canada (I actually had to go into the editor to reread the 1837 Goals to remember going to Cornwall would give me access to Lower Canada. I then built a few more industries with the GT in Lower Canada, and had the C&STL supply most of them, and build much of the track up towards Quebec. After I invested heavily in industries with the GT, it was making several million more than the C&STL, but it still would have taken several years to get enough money to buy out the C&STL, as the C&STL's stock split several times early on with as profitable as it was. During a boom period, the GT was rapidly making money, and I decided it was as good as time as any to take over the C&STL as I wanted to be able to focus on my trains' routes getting to Quebec, and if I switched off the GT extra trains would be added by the AI that would ruin my supplies for industries. I ended up selling off a lot of the C&STL stock, until I just had 51% of the company, then with the price driven way down I was able to acquire the company much easier for millions less. I think this was around 1850-1851. A year later I took over the St. Lawrence Railroad as they had just bought a bakery which would have increased their profits, and I figured I'd take them over before their stock when up.

After the merger I was just a matter of getting all the required goods up to Quebec and waiting for the ability to create the Victorian Bridge. As I was making millions a year and a train only cost 40k, I just created a lot of 1 way trains headed towards Quebec. Once they reached there, I had them "waiting for ammo" which they'd never get, so I could just go up there and retire the trains after they got there, rather than slow the route to Quebec with a lot of trains headed in both directions. I finished around 1863-1864, but unfortunately you have to wait til 1870 to be told that you've won.


Other than I was a little unsure of what to do at times, this is a pretty nice map and if you get your company's finances going right at the very start, it's not too difficult to become very profitable, very quickly.

[Blackhawk]

A few things I noticed:

-1837 Goals says St. Lambert and Odeltown must connect by 1845, but I don't think there is a lose event written for the event this is not accomplished.

-Lose 4 and Briefing 2 say Kingston and Montreal must be connected by 1850, but "1837 Goals" says 1856.

-Lose 13 - says Bytown but tests against Sherbrooke. The wrong city is mentioned in the text, it should be Sherbrooke

-The Ledger events for the GT list the wrong amounts of corn and grains that must be hauled. It says (200) when its 100.

-It may have just been on my play of this map but a munnitions plant appeared west of Drummandville in the middle of no where, I'm not sure if that was intentional or not.

- newspaper june 1846 - increase spelled wrong

- It would be nice to be able to end the map before 1870.

- While I try to play legitimately, some people may want to use exploits for the haulage goals and ship a good in and out of the territory multiple times in order to win. So the use of variables to track corn in versus the amount of corn shipped out, for a total amount of corn in the territory, would need to be used to prevent someone from exploiting on the map.

- A word of warning to those who play, if you open the editor after playing for several years be prepared for it to be slow to open as the editor will be filled with lots of temporary events because of the effects the seasons play in this scenario.

[nedfumpkin]

Thanks...that will help me make the corrections as soon as I get some time. I am also struggling with the two new locomotives that will show up in this map...and struggling with finding time. soon...soon..