Rhodes Unfinished

[Hawk]

The following text is a compilation of what was salvaged from the old Gathering Forum. It contains postings from several different people.
Thanks goes out to Wolverine for putting this all together.

Hawk

Rhodes Unfinished
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This one did not give me nearly as many problems as did Orient Express, but then again, I'd learned a lot by the time I finished Orient Express.
Note that this is on Normal difficulty. I'll probably try the campaign again on Expert sometime, just to see if this still works or not.
First off, I used the spur trick for water/maintenance. It just cuts down train turnaround time so dramatically that it easily pays for itself.
I started by building north, connecting the two rinky-dink cities to big D. Then I discovered that there was a nice little patch of three cattle ranches, and built a dedicated livestock train from a spur station to D. That financed most of my subsequent railroad building until I got to Zanzibar, in 1909. The $300k from the Chieftan didn't hurt, either. By connecting the cities on the Masai plain (excepting the one at the far south on the mountain), I'd made the point where I started to accumulate money. It only took me three bonds to bridge to Zanzibar. From there, money just started pouring in, and the rest was cake.
The key, though, was electrification. The Consolidation just couldn't cut it after the car switchover in 1900. Shortly after Zanzibar, I had the cash to electrify my rails, and switched everything over to 2-D-2's. Those are really great engines for this scenario.
Then I built up the coast, and got the coffee and sugar flowing. Ridiculously profitable. Continued that line all the way into Nairobi. I played honest, with tunnels, and built a usable line, with about five trains on it or so until the end of the game.
Then I expanded the line West from big D. By this time, the primary resource economy of the cities south of Lake Victoria had developed quite substantially, with enormous quantities of wood products, grain, diesel, and livestock ready for hauling. I helped it along a bit with a lumber mill and a brewery over there, but by this point, it was really pretty easy.
I think I finished in 1927 or 1928, just a couple years after the Biploar was introduced, with a book value of around $50 million or so.
I'd had the traffic difficulties I've seen other people report my first couple tries. For my victory, the cattle/meat combo around big D was essential. I could not have financed the reach to Zanzibar without it, and without the connection to Zanzibar I would have never gotten enough traffic onto my network to get out of the early game crunch.
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Does anyone have any good starting strategies for the Rhodes Unfinished scenario...I've restarted it about 5 times now. I can't seem to get enough traffic going at any of the cities near the starting point of the scenario and if I geta bond or sell stock right away I sink my company right off the bat. Any suggestions would help.
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I'm having the same problem. It seems very difficult to eke out any profit here.
I did manage to get a profitable line going from the starting station up into the hills to the NW, where there was a cluster of three cattle farms. I ran a shay fully loaded. Then I continued to extend the line NW, but it's not very profitable and there's no way to make enough money to meet even the bronze VC.
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I restarted this scenario a few times yesterday just looking at it going "how the heck am I going to do this..."
With a bond, the most you can get is I think $1200K.
I'm thinking that perhaps industry is the way to go here -- grab a couple dairy farms or something.
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I too am completely stumped.
If you build a station in the masai plains, and give the chief cattle, he'll end up giving you an extra $200,000 or so, but...there's just no way to make money.
Any clues?
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I managed to get gold on this one, with a few years to spare.
I restarted the scenario over and over until I found a reasonably good setup that allowed me to run from Dodoma to Jamkola at the start, hauling meat one way and lumber the other. I think I had to take out one bond to get it started, but I paid it back within a year and thereafter only took out bonds at 5% or 6%. I then expanded west (I can't remember the town names) to haul the logs to Jamkola (and provide a new market for lumber), then north to Shinyanga and shortly after that to Mwanza. I built my own lumber mill in Jamkola to augment the one already there, and I also built a lumber mill up in the hills to the NW, where there were three logging camps clustered together. Note that I never ran a railroad to that one - but it made a good profit anyway!
By that time express traffic was kicking in and I was making money hand-over-fist, so extending the line up to Kampala and then Juba was not hard at all. By 1924 I had $35M CBV, and ran the line out to Nairobi to wrap up the gold.
That only way I could do this, though, was to just keep restarting it until there was a decent two-way flow of cargo from Dodoma to Jamkola.
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I agree--this one isn't easy and at least in the two tries I had I didn't find that industry could help me much. I made money on freight at first.
Getting the first line in place is the tricky part but connecting to Jambola proved very profitable once things got rolling. I was cash short most of the scenario until I got a weapons factory connected to a barracks quite a ways away. A four car train of weapons brought a couple hundred thousand dollars per trip and that helped fund the end game tho' finding a connection that I could afford over to Nairobi took several tries from a save point. Got gold a year or two before the end.
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I just got gold.
Slow buildup of industry -- paper mills & lumber camps to oil refineries while the cities grow, and then, in a couple years, connected all the cities on the way to Juba, running a train back and forth between each city. Lots of supply and demand built up when no one runs trains for 20 years.
Then I made The Worlds Most Useless Railroad to Nairobi. 22% grade? Sure! Lets for a train ride!
One thing I realized late is that the stock market isn't important -- if you're growing the company you can issue stock as much as possible and rake in some cash that way.
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This one is definitely a 'buy industry first' scenario. It was quite easy once I started snapping up industry. I used the money to run rail along the west side of Lake Victoria. Eventually built the rails and they pay off very well. The city to the north of the lake is where everyone wanted to go.
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This is my first post on this board, but I been a Railroad Tycoon fan for years and have read it many times when I was stumped or looking for user created maps. I just wanted to say thanks for keeping a great forum running, and a special thanks to all you map makers out there, keep up the great work
I have been playing RRT3 almost non-stop since I got it a couple of weeks ago. I went through the first 10 or so without much problem. But the Africa one has really been a pain. I was just curious if anyone had connected to Zanzibar before 1910 and got the 2 million they were offering? I connected it once, but I was in the year 1910 before I connected and you have to connect it BEFORE 1910 to get the cash. I think it cost me at least twice that to connect to it.
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DISCLAIMER: Wimpy player playing on easy first.
Anyway, I have not finished this campaign yet, I just started it last night. I was able to make the connection to Zanzibar by about 1907. I got the two million, paid off 3 of the 7 outstanding bonds I had and set up a couple of train routes. Beyond the $2M bonus (and it did cost at least twice that to make the connection) hauling people and goods over this mountain seems to be pretty profitable. It is also cool as hell to take a train ride over that big span bridge!
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On my second try at this scenario I connected to Zanzibar in 1909. I scraped money and built single track all the way there and only had 5 or 6 bonds out when I got the 2 mil. After that I got out of debt and double tracked the line. Next I connected to Nairobi, running Shay all the way except one fairly flat stretch. Once I got to Nairobi I was in the cash, had enough money to connect to Juba before the Gold deadline but my company wasn't quite worth enough for gold so I settled for silver. If I had given the chief gold instead of cattle I would have probably made it but I was trying out a new option to see what would happen.
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I have gotten gold in this campaign in 1920 on normal difficulty.
First I bought a distillery in the NW corner (near Juba), which was also the only industry I bought. Took out a bond and issued stock (almost the only time I issued stock, 'cause it feels like cheating to me in done every year!). I then connected Dodama to Kinyika (VERY small town to the west) and bought a Shay (It was cheap, and I was pretty short on cash) for the route. There were a lot of stuff from D-K, but nothing on the return route.
After this I took out a new bond ASAP, and connected to Jamkola and Tabara. Then I got the Zanzibar message and started building a route towards them, putting down a new station in all the mountain town on my way east and then connect Tanga. A direct route Tanga-D will bring in lots of money (from hauling mainly weapons) and with this money and even more bonds I made the connection to Zanzibar in 1908. (I think I had $5,00,000 in bonds at 10%+ rate). After this was it fairly easy. I paid back/remortaged some bonds and went from Tabora to Mwanza. At this point did the Consolidation engine (my absolute favorite pre-1900 engine) go out of production, and there were no steam engine ready to take over, so I electrified the whole net, and replaced the Cons. with the 2-D-2 electric engine and built a line west of lake Victoria, eventually reaching Kampala. Then I just went north to Juba, stopping at the larger cities on the way. During this time I started to rake in $3-5 millions in a year, and in 1920 the CBV reasched $35 million and I connected to Nairoibi.
The biggest key to the gold, i think is to take out every bond ASAP until you get to Zanzibar, because the town near Dodoma will only give you a small profit, until you get a big network.
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Thanks for the advice! I did finally get connected to Zanzibar in 1908. I am playing on normal difficulty as well. I started out going up into the mountains first, connecting to Haneti and Kobaya, and gave the chief 50k in gold and got the 5% track building reduction. Instead of Shays I used Consolidations from the start. Expensive, but one of the best all around steam engines ever made. Then once I had some descent profit on cattle and meat I worked back toward the west to Kinyika and Jamkola. Once I got the Zanzibar mission, I connected to Kiberashi and then made a spur connection to the sugar and coffee fields, just to try and squeeze every last bit of profit I could. I think this is the first scenareo that makes you really pay attention to every little detail in the game, at least through the first 7 years. Your right AssClown, that train ride over the bridge is awesome! It's almost a better pay off than the 2 million
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I got gold on normal difficulty in IIRC 1924. I didn't buy a single industry. Right at the start I issued stock and bought a bond to finance growth westward to that town that starts with K and then to the one that starts with J that's a little further on, and then to the one that starts with T that's a little NW of the J-town. Sorry I don't remember the names. Ran two 2-truck Shays back and forth between those and Dodoma. I ran a line out to a place where I could hit 2 cattleyards with a medium station, and gave the chief $50k in cattle. From then on it was pretty hairy. I took out another bond or two (I forget) and built east of Dodoma up the hills to Robela or whatever that town is. Once I had that connected an economic boom helped me start making some money and getting better credit. In 1909 I bought a ton of bonds and went out to Zanzibar and a coastal town near there. After that it was smooth sailing. There were some times when money was stretched but I was mostly above water.
At that point I basically just raced to Juba as fast as my income would let me. Then once I hit Juba, I ran a useless railroad to Nairobi that was about 50% purple grade. Then, I found I had mis-remembered the book value required for Gold (the medal screen doesn't show you), and I only had 25 million instead of 35 million. So I started a few trains to and from Nairobi...and accidentally built Atlantics!!!!! Hahahahaha...I think it took them a year just to climb out of that gorge west of the city!!! At that point though, I just needed a few more years to make $35 million.
But anyway that is how I won.
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I start by buying as much industry as I can, and try to grow my railroad in a way that helps the industries I own. One of my favourite strategies is to place paper, lumber, distilleries or refineries at river intersections in or near Moyuwasi swamp. The finished products sail down the river to Tabora, which is my second hub after Dodoma. There are no load haul requirements so there is no hurry to connect Juba or Nairobi. I tried a few times to connect Zanzibar but was never finished in time.
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This campaign is real easy on EASY setting but, so far, to me has been impossible on HARD setting. The economics go so far down that I simply cant make any money so cant get to Zanzibar and collect that $2m and - because there's always a recession after a couple of years the Industry route doesn't seem to work.
So hints please!?
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Forget Sansibar
Start the map and check the industries in the start city and the closest ones. If you don't see a couple of supply/demand situations, restart.
It may need 5-10 restarts for a promising start for gold.
(and, be generous AND sensitive for the native tribes)
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I did this on Normal.
1. Forget Zanzibar.
2. Give the Chief gold.
3. A blend of industry and hub-spoke. I connect 3 small cities to Dodoma, then connect to Tabora and give it about 3 small cities. As I expand, I look for business opportunities.
4. I haven't played in a while but I believe victory is simply a connection requirement. So there is no hurry, just grow track in the general direction you need to go to win, then finish by laying cheap track when you can easily afford to.
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dunno about normal, but on hard the pain in this mission is the very beginning. Once you are so far as Tabora, the rest is routine.
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Got gold on hard after several tries. RR_Veteran is right. The start is everything.Got a so-so seed with a meat packing plant, and several cattle ranches up in the Masai country, but not much else.
First year - Built cheapest possible track to Haneti and ran one Shay on it to small station. Made peace with Masai chieftian, and got rewarded. Issued stock, but no bonds. (This line, by the way, turned out to be a gold mine. Over the years, the one Shay engine earned almost 5mil in profits!)
Second year - Using first years profits, Masai gift, and stock proceeds, built line to Kinyika. No bonds-one Shay.
Third year - Pushed on to Jamkola using stock proceeds and RR profits to finance track.
By now, my credit rating was up to A, so I took out 2 bonds, issued more stock, and built to Tabora. As RR_Veteran noted, after this further expansion was pretty routine.
Issued stock whenever possible. Didn't buy industry until I got to Lake Victoria, and then bought one brewery and one lumber mill that looked promising. After the required connections were made, I bought industry like mad in order to meet CBV requirement.
Used Shays throughout, and was really impressed by these little fellas. One engine made almost a million in one trip from Nairobi to Victoria port. Unfortunately, subsequent trips weren't so juicy.
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Thanks I'll try this tomorrow. I've been trying the Industry approach but got nowhere. In the past my line to Haneti has been totally unproductive on Hard (fine on Easy) but I'll give it another go.
Using Industry as my main profit source until Tabora has not worked (and although better I've not found connecting to T is that brilliant) my best is bronze. I gotta emphasise that I'm only talking Hard setting. It's easy below.
Next problem is Japan - I can make a fortune but still cant find enough outlets to get the necessary goods to Niigata partly because the prices at every other port mean they'd rather go there!
If people want to tell me how just say and I'll open a new thread.
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I gave the chief some lifestock and got diamonds back a year later or so.
For Japan - meat is quite simple but cloth is the problem. later in the game it will appear at the beach near a town. You need to build a station on that beach for get enough cloth to make gold on hard.
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Yeah, livestock not gold. (tht's what I meant with generous AND sensitive)
Though he is a wise man and appreciates your gold, diamonds are more useful in this situation than some track building bonus. IMO.
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Absolutely - Diamonds are a tycoons best friend.
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Fascinating how the games change each time you play them. On Rhodes I can get to Tabora o/k but I still cant bring in enough cash to expand after that. On Japan I had lots of meat in the NE but no clothing. Next try no meat in the NE ever but some appeared in SW - still no clothing anywhere so I finished 99/20. Supposedly clothing appears at a port late on but I've never had any and last game I'd connected to every port. I'm getting so fed I'm now playing the Scenarios on Expert and with maximum opposition. The first is dead easy.
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I got gold in 1917 using the Industry approach. At the beginning, I buy access to north eastern part of the map, and I spend everything I have to build paper mills. Cheap industry, high income. I did then the same with textile factories and lumber mills.
I started to build the railways in 1914. One year to go to Nairobi : you can build a tunnel under Mawenzi volcano, the small unnamed volcano west of Kilimandjaro.
Second year to reach Victoria lake, third year to Juba.
I've never been to Zanzibar, neither to Masai territory.
PS : I think that industries are to efficient in RR3. 90% of the scenarios are achievable using an all-industry strategy. To bad for a "railroad" game. They should either increase the cost of industries, either decrease the income.
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If all else fails though, try pressing the (.) on the keyboard and type "we have a winner gold." That'll give you the gold nice and easy.
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I played this one on the hard level yesterday without having played it on normal. I think that most of what says is correct. I didn't stay with the Shay, though and changed to electric trains. They are much faster to say it carefully and way more reliable. The Shay has high maintenance.
Some tips:
1) Look for a new cheap cattle ranch which will pop out of the ground after the Massais give you $300,000 in return for giving them cows they love so much. Save about $600,000 for that ranch! It will make your game when you are able to connect it soon. That depends on the location.
2) Look forward and buy industries where you will connect soon.
3) As an investor your only goal is to help your company. Buy the shares after issuing new stocks to avoid a price slide. Don't start early with stock dilution. First issue at least 2 bonds. Depression times are ahead.
4) Avoid Zanzibar trap.
Rhodes on expert level should be a real challenge
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Thanks for all these - I meant Expert level and have still not got Gold (altho I gave up trying after half a dozen attempts). Connected the towns o/k but was always an odd $m short on Company Book Value and it got boring playing the same sort of game just to try to raise an extra tiny amount.
I never noticed a new ranch, but did buy two profitable oil wells and copnnected to a western town which was off route but proved immensely profitable but, basically, I followed the advise here.
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1. Forget Zanzibar.
2. I make a little track to Haneti. Now I am reminded of the Shay, that will be the engine to go with next time. Iive the chief gold or cattle. Cattle generates cash to buy more businesses right away. Gold gives a small track discount. My style of playing would benefit more from giving cattle.
3. I buy industry. My favorite place is among the rivers west of Tabora. Oil can be good if I buy it early, there is a refinery at Tabora, and there are not too many oil wells. I can buy paper and lumber mills in Tabora, or build some at strategic locations among the rivers.
4. A little while later I might build a textile mill near Zanzibar. Dodoma is good if there are two sheep farms to supply it. Then maybe an oil refinery in Tabora if I am not too late.
5. With industry now rolling, I make tracks toward Tabora...
6. ...Cha-ching!
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Rhodes on expert level should be a real challenge
In my opinion this is the best map included with the game, doing it without connecting to Zanzibar takes most of the challenge and fun away from it. It is possible to connect to Zanzibar and still get gold. I have done it both on normal and expert. Connecting to Zanzibar opens up some big profit opportunities from the port and textile mill there. Plus the ride over the bridge makes it well worth the effort. If you haven't at least tried it, you are missing out on some great gameplay.
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Many of the postings for getting gold on this board I've seen for Orient Express have recommended a style emphasizing industry, often by spending your entire starting income on dairy farms or other such things. I'm sure that works - if it didn't, it would not be so highly recommended. However, I just don't like waiting around, and I like running trains. Lots of them.
You can with a train-centered strategy even on this map. In my gold game, my income breakdown went like this
Express - $8, 417k / $52, 059k lifetime
Freight - $11, 139k / $59, 739k lifetime
Industry - $3, 704k / $20, 257k lifetime
I finished in 1899. I only started one company, and I did not buy any of my rivals except when liquidated. I did not declare bankruptcy, and I only occasionally issued stock, usually only after a 2-1 split - my purchasing power could not afford anything more. I ended the game owning about a quarter of my company's stock. From about mid-game on, I tried to maintain a decent dividend, but it was never TOO large because I needed revenue to fund constant growth.
In my opinion, you need a particular setup to win this map. You need a bunch of logs near Zagreb, a bunch of produce near Budapest, and at least one port at Constanta. You also need the resources to make steel either at Gyor or Maribor. Otherwise, you'll never be able to get enough freight traffic in the system to reach the necessary level of profitibility.
I started early with the trains, blowing my entire opening wad by connecting Vienna and Budapest, and putting a little depot in Zagreb just to make sure no computer players started there. I then built a station in Gyor, connected to Bratislava, and then built south to Kecksmet, Szeged, and Novi-Sad. Then it was south to Zagreb. It was not until I'd connected the towns between Vienna and Zagreb, and had nearly completed a southern loop from Zagreb to Novi-Sad, that I bought my first industry, a paper mill near Zagreb.
Early in the game, Express revenue was absolutely key. There just wasn't enough freight in the network to support things alone, but I was continually surprised at how much Express traffic the map generated with the proper stimulus. I connected three or four cities with a single dedicated express train, having it stop at every city each way. I also made sure to build the maintenance buildings and towers on spurs, and I chose the speed advantage. With all that, my Stirlings were averaging 40 mph, while carrying four cars and a caboose. My express trains were also just plain more profitable - I ended with a lifetime express revenue at $229/load mile, while freight only managed $140.
The key was to stop at every city, even if there was no traffic for the first run. Express profitability is determined much more by the total amount of passenger/mail carloads in the network, not by the where/to of individual routes. Since passengers don't start to appear until there are trains running where they want to go, the key to maximizing the yield of the network is to make sure to have a stop in every city, even if it is infrequent.
The other biggie was the Orca. It's a dumb concept and it looks ugly, but man was it nice. I got it in 1893. Luckily enough, there was a functioning meat plant in Russia, and I just connected it to Christinau. That brought the average haul from a good express train from about $150k to about $300k, as I could increase the number of cars to 5, add a dining car to each express train, and because faster trains mean a lower decay in value during travel, and more cars carried each year due to quicker turnaround time.
The thing is, though, is that those Russian routes are profitable in and of themselves - especially once you can connect them to Galati and Tulcea. You bring Oil, Grain, and livestock south, take diesel, meat, clothing, and alcohol north, and take passengers everywhere. Believe it or not, you can run profitable express trains between all those rinky-dink Russian cities, the profitibility helped quite a bit by the long hauls between them. This is especially true when you connect to Constanta, as it pumps a huge amount of express traffic into the network.
The next step is to build West from Constanta, connecting the central Romanian cities. There's a lot of potential there, but you need to build a lot of industry to make it worth your while. A paper mill, a lumber mill, a steel plant, and maybe a Tool and Die - with those in place, distributed amongst the Western Romanian cities, and that area is just as good as Hungary. In my first game, when I had resigned myself to silver and was just waiting out the end, I even managed to get an auto industry going around Constanta and Calarasi.
Getting the Weapons Industry going in Hungary, either at Novi-Sad or Arad, will make the hideously expensive tunnel from Timisora into Romania pay for itself quickly. You'll typically have a price differential of $150k or $200k from source to destination (Constanta), and that goes a long way towards making the tunnel profitable. That, and shipping clothing, logs, and iron back from Romania.
So, if you connect every city in Austro-Hungary, the majority of cities in Romania, and a good chunk of Russia, you should make a fistful of dollars in train revenue on a regular basis. I had no more than ten industries by the end of the game, and about four of them I'd built in Romania fewer than two years before I won gold. THe most profitable was the Oil Refinery at Galati, and it always will be - make sure you get it. I also had a Hotel in Budapest that was pulling in $100k a turn.
The thing about this strategy is, you really have to pay attention to your train routing to make sure that major bottlenecks don't develop in your freight distribution system, and you have to expand constantly. About five years before the end of the game, my steel mill in Maribor just decided to stop making steel, because it's coal supply had dried up due to growth in demand from the accursed power plants. This is especially a problem on this map because there are SO MANY BOTTLENECKS! Industries are programmed to never appear where there are resources, resources are spread out (except logs), and there's never enough coal. That's why this is a hard map. But it can be overcome. Anyways, long-distance routes are usually more profitable.
Due to declining demand and market saturation, running a rail-focused game is like running a pyramid scheme - you need to keep growing or else you profitability will collapse and you'll get a really nasty margin call. That is what killed me in my previous games - after 1900 you almost always experience a drop in profitiability, and that is just lethal if you're seriously extended on margin.
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This one did not give me nearly as many problems as did Orient Express, but then again, I'd learned a lot by the time I finished Orient Express.
Note that this is on Normal difficulty. I'll probably try the campaign again on Expert sometime, just to see if this still works or not.
First off, I used the spur trick for water/maintenance. It just cuts down train turnaround time so dramatically that it easily pays for itself.
I started by building north, connecting the two rinky-dink cities to big D. Then I discovered that there was a nice little patch of three cattle ranches, and built a dedicated livestock train from a spur station to D. That financed most of my subsequent railroad building until I got to Zanzibar, in 1909. The $300k from the Chieftan didn't hurt, either. By connecting the cities on the Masai plain (excepting the one at the far south on the mountain), I'd made the point where I started to accumulate money. It only took me three bonds to bridge to Zanzibar. From there, money just started pouring in, and the rest was cake.
The key, though, was electrification. The Consolidation just couldn't cut it after the car switchover in 1900. Shortly after Zanzibar, I had the cash to electrify my rails, and switched everything over to 2-D-2's. Those are really great engines for this scenario.
Then I built up the coast, and got the coffee and sugar flowing. Ridiculously profitable. Continued that line all the way into Nairobi. I played honest, with tunnels, and built a usable line, with about five trains on it or so until the end of the game.
Then I expanded the line West from big D. By this time, the primary resource economy of the cities south of Lake Victoria had developed quite substantially, with enormous quantities of wood products, grain, diesel, and livestock ready for hauling. I helped it along a bit with a lumber mill and a brewery over there, but by this point, it was really pretty easy.
I think I finished in 1927 or 1928, just a couple years after the Biploar was introduced, with a book value of around $50 million or so.
I'd had the traffic difficulties I've seen other people report my first couple tries. For my victory, the cattle/meat combo around big D was essential. I could not have financed the reach to Zanzibar without it, and without the connection to Zanzibar I would have never gotten enough traffic onto my network to get out of the early game crunch.
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I've been trying to get through the campaigns ignoring industry and relying on train income only, but I can't figure a way to do it with this puppy.
Getting gold on normal is a piece of cake if I rely on industry, but there doesn't seem to be enough startup cash to get a prosperous train route going. I have just enough to reach a couple of local hick towns that, between them, might ship a carload every year or so barely paying expenses.
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I don't think you can do this one w/o the subsidy industry provides. The first year on each connection seems to be IT for revenue off the initial two.
The freight connections pay well, you just have to get to them. If you discover a way to it w/o industry you will be a RT3 god in my eyes
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Getting industry going was no problem. I had two upgraded timber mills, one upgraded textile mill and two paper mills before I started laying track.
The thing is, I really wanted to win the campaign using RR income only, and I can't figure any way to do this. I keep ending up having to go the industry route in order to get enough cash to expand.
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I made it w/o industry, but a couple of restarts were inevitable
So I abstain from being a god, HOB
Hint: some small gifts for some aboriginal inhabitants can sometimes work wonders
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I finished this on gold without buying any industry, just took 2 bonds and connected all city's on my way north that had ~1 star or more, get electric trains as soon as you can, they are much faster, can climb much faster and you can allow them to take 8 cars without much speed drop.
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This was one was easier than some of the others for me. I took one line west and another north that then veered off for the coast. The line west was bringing in oil to my start city. The native gift was also a timely bonus for me as well.
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I really can't understand how some of you are able to play with only industries. I've tried on two occations on campaign maps. Both times I went for the lumber mill.
Well, started, took out the bond and had enough to place the mill. The mill slowly made a bit more profit each year, but not enough to get access to more bonds early on.
After 5-6 years I gave up and restarted the scenario using trains instead, and as usual I had about 10 cities connected after 3 years, and money was no longer an issue.
What industry do you guys start with, since you can afford to buy new ones so quickly? Or do you buy 2-3 of the cheap ones instead? The farms etc?
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I can't play with industries either! I am so bad at it, that for a while I thought that buying an industry ment you get all the things they produce!!! Trains are neither too easy or too challenging for me, and since I like trains, I really enjoy just building a Railroad Network and making it a profit.
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I managed to get the silver on this @ hard difficulty using trains only. I'm going to come back to get the gold later. I got the connection to Nairobi with about 7 years to spare, but had a problem getting the CNW up to the gold level. But then, the darn economy spent the last 4 or 5 years in a recession, so there ya' go.
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In all the RR games I tend to be fixated on freight. Probably why I can't make a profitable RR w/o playing the industry game
Mr.X want to get to Rosebud? Who cares!!!
Detroit wants furniture and LOTS of it....Yummmm!
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How ...
I tried for the 5Th time
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Haven't done this one in ages. If you connect to the town straight out and give the chief cattle, I believe that gets you 10k pocket money. Building a lumber mill over on the left-hand side of the map can be a money-maker (if the map is like the one I played on)
Aside from that, its just connecting and keeping an eye out for profitable investments. I think by the end of that one I owned meatpacking, cattle ranches, a brewery, grain farms and an oil refinery. Hauling weapons were a huge moneymaker one time I played this map. There was a factory on the right-hand side and when I connected to a place with a port (I think it was) the haulage was huge. That may have just been a random thing though.
Good luck
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Yep, it's a nasty one. You don't have much resources, the economy goes down frequently and you start in an area with hills and mountains. But, there's hope. I won't give you a complete walkthrough, but I can give you some hints.
1. start laying track up (North?) and give the African chief some cattle. He will reward this with diamonds.
2. Later on you receive a request to connect Zanzibar to the mainland. I tried this a couple of times, but I couldn't make it. As long as you don't have enough cities connected there's no place to ship the coffee and sugar to. Furthermore, the bridge to Zanzibar is just as expensive as the reward.
3. Buy profitable business, grainfields being a cheap and stable one. Stick to nature, just like the Africans themselves.
4. Building a track and then just "sitting and waiting for the revenue" doesn't work here, you must keep expanding. There isn't much to transport, so after a couple of rides you start riding virtually empty trains. I borrow a lot of money (expensive bonds ) to connect to the larger cities asap. Frequent hauling over rivers and across mountainridges is the way to make some money.
5. In the beginning, bring the livestock from the hills to your starting station and connect to the cities in the river area. The like the meat.
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I just got through that one. Missed gold by about 10million book value.
I tried several times going north and east but could never get a good economy going. Even the time I managed to hook into high value coffee loads it didn't last more than a couple trips before prices leveled out.
The last time I made a serious push to the city to the west and north a bit Tambora or some such name. That link was tough to get for sure but I focused all effort on making it work connecting the towns to the west of your starting city on the way. Once the link was made I never had money problems again. Ok, I didn't handle the money perfectly or I would have the gold, but I never really worried about cash. The key here is that there are many rivers running through the swampland there which correlated to vast amount of commodities for transport. I cornered oil and fuel for industry base and was making 2 million a year just from refineries.
Next run along the lake (western side) to the town on the city on the north shore. That was where there was a huge weapon stockpile in my scenario. If it isn't there, run a track to wherever the weapon stockpile is huge. That will rake in massive amounts of money.
I got so caught up in electrifying everything and maxing out my oil business and running rail through the volcanos to Nairobi that I forgot to pursue the book value goal. Running high bridges over smoking volcano craters is worth doing by the way, just for the imagery.
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I got Gold without buying a single industry- certaintly the Masai Chief is critical, as the map logically, as a Railway builder sends you West first- a brilliant map I thought because of it!
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I had Gold on this map, first try. The key is to start small and not get too crazy with expansion. I got the cattle from the town, and I also conneceted to Zangried on the Island. That one took about $5M in debt to do though!
The best way is to build west and connect to the river valley, town by town. Use one train for more than one town. There's good possibilities for lumber and paper profit over there.
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Connecting Zanzibar on a single track bridge is about 1.75m dollars- Ignore the offer if you didn't buy farms at the onset, as they are the only way you can get the funds on bonds otherwise (steady income). Coffee plantations are the best earners on this map in the beginning, they earn about twice the rate of a grain farm.
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I ignore the Zanzibar missiomn. I have never connected in time, so it doesn't really matter how big the reward is.
I look in the swamps west of Tabora for opportunities. If there are three or fewer oil wells there, they will be profitable until households stop accepting oil directly. If there is already an oil refinery at Tabora they are set. Similarly, you can buy orchards in this area. Also look for any coffee plantations.
I make sure I have enoug left to builld a small rr around Dodoma - the 3 nearest places straight north, east and west. Then I expand towards Tabora.
Somewhere around this time I look around Tabora again. I will look at the cargo streams for logs and pulp and build lumber and pulp mills, intercepting the cargo that is goilng to existing mills.
Then I finish my expansion to Tabora, and when I haul away the products, all the industries that I own there will really start to make money. I have to make sure I have a market for the oil. About this time, households stop accepting oil, so I need an oil refinery for my oil wells.
Around Tabora I connect the nearest towns and set up Tabora as my second hub. I expand to the large city on the south shore of Lake Victoria. It often has a port and pulls in resources from the hinterland.
I fill out my repertoire of industries - furniture factories, meat packers and distilleries.
Now I am making so much money, all I have to do is burn track to the two connection cities. I never bother to set up trains north of Lake Victoria because I am already making lots of money.
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That's interesting- first time round I brought no industry at all- 2nd time I brought like mad- One thing is certain, if Dodama has usless processing industries like a saw mill you might as well start again. I always built my railway along the East side on the map- how is it is you go North via the West side?
I still think this is the best map within the campaign for frustration though if you accept all the farms/industry at start and don't re-load.
I never really looked beyond the immediate area for other industry though, as we all do with dairy farms; that are in RRT3 what a Steel-mill was in RRT2!
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You must use all skills in this one.
Must buy industry. After 5-10 years, depending on what you bought, they start to make free profit.
Beware of high interest ! Try to borrow ONLY the necessary.
But what really won the scenario for me was setting up a long term-plan. In my case it was : "Build a lumber mill on the western delta, distributing it initially through the rivers. Later, connect everything with railroads, upgrade the lumber mill, build paper mill to consume pulpwood and furniture factory for extra profit"
If you don't plan long-term to CREATE cargo to haul, you're lost. This map has very low supply/demand. Even with many cities connected, prices saturate fast.
So you must plan carefully which goods you can get at an even LOWER prices, so the differential is high enough for a profitable run.
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Whilst we agree Industry is the key on this map, I certainly couldn't afford to build my own within the first 10 yerars, and didn't need to thereafter.
I reckon if you get one single Coffee farm ONLY to the East of Dodama at start, buy it, It'll get about £70k from start, two will net you about £85k only. Get a ranch near a Dodama with a packing plant is also good.
I also agree, bonding-up to the maximim isn't good- If a new player: don't fall for the Zanibar connection, the money offered doesn't even pay for the bridge! (I've also failed to get the money many times as well.
All,
On that Bridge aspect I looked at the triggers, any chance of one of the seniors posting exactly what that the Variables mean within the editor?
(I think the connection was G-vari 4 to 1 or something, why not simply make the connection based upon months in that instance?)
An explanation of the "variables" would be welome by all scenario-makers if only we understood the d-am-n things!
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Got gold playing at hard difficulty as follows:
a - Built line to Masai town and did the cattle-diamond deal with the chief. If the game opens with a meat packing plant in DoDoma, this line can make a lot of money, otherwise it's so-so early on.
b - There were several logging camps in the Moyowasi Swamp above Malagarasi. Built Lumber and paper mills, plus a furniture factory. All these were upgraded.
c - As finances permitted, I connected Dodomo-Kinyika-Jamkola-Tabora-Malagarasi with maintenance spurs at Dodomo and Malagarasi. Then ran a trunk line up to my wood processing center at Moyowasi. By the time I was ready to build RRs, electric trains were available and I used these.
By this time my income was 1 - 2 million/year and I used this plus selling stock every year to push RR construction to Nairobi and Juba. Reached Juba in 1919 still needing 8m in CBV. Met this requirement by paying off bonds and accumulation cash.
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I started by going into Masai territory, then expanding to the nearest Western town. Since profits were so slim to start, I made sure not to overburden myself with debt.
Once I got to Tanga in the north east, I then connected to Tambora. I then concentrated on building a mainline up the western side of the lake to Kampala. Once that happened, I had enough traffic built up to keep the flow going.
About that time I electrified, upgraded locos, and watched my costs go way down. I didn't own any industries when I hit gold.
I did have so much fun that I played past the 1980s. After a point, this map becomes a huge cash cow. I had 6 or 7 five-star cities and a bunch of 3 and 4+ star cities. Passenger volumes were low, but freight revenues more than made up for it.
By the time I finally got bored, I had connected all of the named cities and several of the unnamed houses and churches, etc. that popped up. Yearly revenues were huge and I was sitting on over $200million in cash. At normal speed, I made money faster than I could spend it on industries.

[Gumboots]

Was just playing this one again, just to see what I could do with it, and found a handy little trick. It seems that sometimes, if you start a bridge over the ocean so it runs across a river delta, this will trick the game into thinking it's just a bridge over a river. The result is that instead of having to pay for a suspension bridge, you can get away with building a normal steel bridge at about half the cost. This also has easier ramps at the ends than a suspension bridge, so it's better for traffic flow too.



Whether it works or not seems to be a bit tricky, but it's definitely worth trying. I'm going to try this trick on some other maps and see how much value I can get out of it (it saved about one million in this instance).

Speaking of "what I could do with it", I had a good seed to start with and was able to buy a working distillery at Malindi for 900k + 100 k access costs to Kenya. Well worth it, because returns were around 250 k per annum right from the start. This is very rare for this scenario. Things are usually very tight at the start, if playing on the hardest level.

Result was Gold in October 1917, which is a record for me on this map. Played to the Gold deadline at end of 1927 just for fun, to see what I'd end up with. CBV was over 100 million, PNW was over 25 million, and no personal debt.

Ended up with over 40 million worth of track. My 2c is it's better to give the chief gold so you get the track laying cost reduction. That will end up saving you at least one million, even if you're skimpy on track, so IMO it's a better deal than a 300k lump sum if you're going for book value. OTOH, you don't get the savings all at once early in the game, so it's a bit of a toss up as to which is ultimately better. If you're only going to lay the absolute minimum of track and you have something constructive you can do with that 300 k right now, give the chief cattle instead.

Anyway, once you get going on this map, it's a total gold mine. It's just the first few years that can be deadly. Even so, getting Gold on the hardest setting without using electric is always possible. You just have to be cunning.

[Gumboots]

I was just trying this bridge trick again. It's bit weird. For some reason it wont work with timber bridges (just in case you want to be a real cheapskate). It only seems to work with steel bridges. No idea why.

I didn't try stone, since the idea was to do things cheap and in this scenario there are no locos which could really make use of the additional speed allowed by stone bridges.

Anyway, I found I can get it to work with steel bridges consistently on the river mouth shown in the screenshot, and on the second river mouth further back in the same shot. The placement and angle is critical though. If it's even slightly off, you are stuck with a suspension bridge. You have to play around with it until it drops into place.

I found this by accident yesterday, when I was just expecting to use a supension bridge and was adjusting the angle onto the island for best effect. I suddenly noticed it was dropping into standard steel bridge mode in a very narrow range. It was blink and you'd miss it stuff, so if it doesn't work first time just undo any track and try some other angles.

Also, after hooking up Nairobi this time I had a thought that maybe it would be possible to go to Juba over the top of the mountains (Nairobi > Nakuru > Eldoret > Soroti). Turns out it's possible with reasonable grades and without using tunnels or bridges. Maximum grade was 5 in a few short spots, with most of it being 4 or less. I was amazed. Great for train rides, and Ye Decapods with five cars make easy work of it.

I kinda like a good track laying challenge sometimes.

[Wolverine@MSU]

I kinda like a good track laying challenge sometimes.

Me too. After mastering the basic strategies involved in getting a Company up and running (profitably), one turns to the more sublime tactics involved in laying track that provides gentle slopes, even if it means a longer route or an occasional switchback. I find it amusing to see how the AIs sometimes lay track over hills/mountains. Nevermind that grades go well over 10% in some cases, they use the old "shortest distance" algorithm to place track and let their locos slow to a snail's pace trying to negotiate them. It's really annoying sometimes when you HAVE to take them over, because all you can do is bulldoze their insanely laid track and start fresh.

[Gumboots]

Did a bit more looking around. The big complaint about this scenario is that it's almost impossible to get a good start, especially on the hardest setting. After re-evaulating my approach to it and trying a number of starts just to see what's available, I'm almost convinced that it's always possible to get a good start. If anyone finds a seeding that really does make a good start impossible, I'd be interested to see a copy.

At the start of this scenario, there seems to be no value in buying up primary producers (farms, etc). When you check these at the game start they will often be returning 15% or more of the purchase price, but once you buy them and start running the game the returns will usually drop to around 10%. This makes a huge difference in the intial stages.

Your basic running costs for the company in the first year will be around $45k even if you don't take out any bonds. This is higher than usual, because you're stuck with some station and track maintenance costs from the beginning, which is enough to double the basic company running costs.

Assuming you start by issuing two lots of stock and using all your 700k seed money to buy farms, you'll get back a maximum of about 80k revenue. Subtract the 45k worth of overheads, etc and you'll be left with 35k profit for the year. That will also be all the cash your company has at the end of the first year. Your credit rating will be stuck on CCC and your stock value will have dropped to around $35. At this point, you are screwed. If you take out a bond at the start to buy more farms it gets worse, because the returns on the extra farms will probably be slightly less than the 11% interest on your bond.

Short version: forget farms at the start. They work really well at the start of some scenarios, but not this one.

It appears as though the key to this map is the cheap territory access costs. All of them are only 100k, so they are all accessible from the start if there's enough return on buying in. You need to buy something immediately to offset the company running costs. To get off to a good start in this scenario, you have to look everywhere on the map for your first purchase and make sure you pick the best one.

If there is a paper mill available that is just ramping up to full production and is still available for 550k (like at Tabora) you may be able to get away with not taking out a bond. It has to have an established resource stream though. If there is not a solid stream of pulpwood already heading in, and close enough to be used in the first year, it's no good. Usually, the resource stream will be too patchy and diluted to make decent money the first year. This means it's better to put off buying that mill until a year or two later.

In this scenario you usually have to take out a bond at the start. It's the only way to get enough cash to do something worthwhile. With the interest from one bond included, the total first year cost for your company will be 98k. To end up with a decent credit rating and stock price at the end of the first year, you need to show at least 70k profit. That means you do not want to buy anything that will not make you a sure 170k.

One of the best common options seems to be a sawmill in Juba, which is something you might miss if you weren't really looking. This is often available for an even 1 million, and its profit record will show 5-10k for its first year listed (1900) and well over 200k for the last year listed (1901). This is perfect. It's just starting production, so prices are good. It has enough draw on the logs to keep going, and it's making enough profit to kick your company off well.

Don't issue stock yet. It wont raise enough to do anything useful and will only dilute your stock unnecessarily. Just take out a bond and buy that mill. You should end your first year with over 100k clear profit. From there it should all be pretty easy.

Work on getting to Zanzibar before 1910. Aim to get there in 1908, and use as many bonds and stock issues as it takes. Zanzibar is worth it, because it will give you a $2 million boost to your book value and it will bring in useful traffic early in the game. If you get the Zanzibar bonus, you have the game in the bag and can pretty much play it however you like from there.

[Alfed E Neumann]

In order to win this, you need a good business opportunity that you can still exploit even with your meager funds. That's a question of luck and/or cheating. You can:

• -just get lucky the first time you try this.
  -restart this scenario until you get a setup where your meager funds can be put to good use.
  -occasionally, good farms spring up, esp. cattle and coffee. Save-and-reload until you manage to snatch a few of them in your first year.
  -just hit Shift-E and place an industry where you want it. Hit Shift-E again and buy it cheap.

After my third restart, I chose the last option.

The second mean trick is to get rid of Dodoma: you need to connect it in order to win the scenario, but that's no reason to start there. Bulldoze all your track and the station, this only costs 40k and allows you to chose a new starting position for your railroad.

Finally, don't worry too much about Zanzibar. The cash bonus pretty much pays for the suspension bridge and station; on top of that, a few new Cotton Farms will appear on the island. That's quite good if you happen to be near there anyway; but if you start in Tabora as I did, the benefit's not worth it.

[Gumboots]

Did a bit more looking around. The big complaint about this scenario is that it's almost impossible to get a good start, especially on the hardest setting. After re-evaulating my approach to it and trying a number of starts just to see what's available, I'm almost convinced that it's always possible to get a good start. If anyone finds a seeding that really does make a good start impossible, I'd be interested to see a copy.

Also, why are you using a suspension bridge when you can use an ordinary steel bridge? You're playing for book value anyway, and the cost of the bridge and station get added to your book value. If you use an ordinary steel bridge you get an instant $2 million boost to your book value, and roughly half of that is cash you can still play with. A free $1 million cash early in the game is a good thing.

[low_grade]

I kinda like a good track laying challenge sometimes.

Me too. After mastering the basic strategies involved in getting a Company up and running (profitably), one turns to the more sublime tactics involved in laying track that provides gentle slopes, even if it means a longer route or an occasional switchback. I find it amusing to see how the AIs sometimes lay track over hills/mountains. Nevermind that grades go well over 10% in some cases, they use the old "shortest distance" algorithm to place track and let their locos slow to a snail's pace trying to negotiate them. It's really annoying sometimes when you HAVE to take them over, because all you can do is bulldoze their insanely laid track and start fresh.

Ha ha! Sounds like you're talking about my Chile map! That dang company that starts out of Santiago always does something stupid, usually involving tunnels and at least a few 18+ grades, to get to Rancagua... And I have to take it over and just bulldoze...

[EPH]

For 'Rhodes' I always just look for a good place to put the paper mill I can buy at the start and then grow a modest rail/industrial empire. Once you get to the coast or the lakes the industrial opportunities open up and the rail lines begin paying good money.

[Gumboots]

That's not always the best way of starting this one. You'd be better off looking around for other options too.

[Gold Boy]

I have found that putting down $100,000 stations instead of $50,000 size is one of the keys.

[RulerofRails]

I have found that putting down $100,000 stations instead of $50,000 size is one of the keys.

I noticed you were new here. Welcome!

I agree with you about not using the small $50,000 stations. I rarely ever use them anywhere, I don't view them as being worth their cost except if only a connection is required for a bonus or if I want to cover only one industry in a town. In short, when you want to make money from a connection don't use them.

If you like this map, (I do) you could try African Dream and Drums of War, two harder re-makes of this map available from the downloads section. If you don't have an account for downloads you will need to ask Hawk for one.

[Hawk]

If you don't have an account for downloads you will need to ask Hawk for one.

See this thread.

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3607

[Cliff]

... At the start of this scenario, there seems to be no value in buying up primary producers (farms, etc). When you check these at the game start they will often be returning 15% or more of the purchase price, but once you buy them and start running the game the returns will usually drop to around 10%. This makes a huge difference in the intial stages.
...
Work on getting to Zanzibar before 1910. Aim to get there in 1908, and use as many bonds and stock issues as it takes. Zanzibar is worth it, because it will give you a $2 million boost to your book value and it will bring in useful traffic early in the game. If you get the Zanzibar bonus, you have the game in the bag and can pretty much play it however you like from there.

I just finished this campaign scenario for the 2nd or 3rd time [the first time was when RRT3 was brand new, what was it, 12-15 years ago?] So, anyway, I got the gold several years early, on hard, by ignoring both of your suggestions. First off I bought all the corn farms I could afford after issuing stock twice at the get-go and floating a bond at 11%. I was able to get about 4 corn farms, and then I blew about $600K half-way through the first year by buying two cattle ranches which turned out to be losers. Oh yeah, I bull-dozed the starting track and station. The industry profits enabled me to start laying track after the first two years; I started at Tabora & the rail traffic was very lucrative. I built around the west side of Lake Victoria to the 3-star city at the north end of the lake. Made about 2 million $$ from there by carrying weapons to the southern cities. Never thought any more about Zanzibar -- would have given it a try if I had needed to get close while connecting to Nairobi, but I managed to get to Nairobi over the mountains instead: long curving path but no grade more than 5% in a couple of places.

[Gumboots]

I was doing it without bulldozing Dodoma at the start. I figure that's the pukka way to do it. Was also playing on Expert level, with steam only.

[Cliff]

I was doing it without bulldozing Dodoma at the start. I figure that's the pukka way to do it. Was also playing on Expert level, with steam only.

I readily admit that I hadn't played RRT3 for many years, but used to be quite good at it. I have always played the scenarios at the Expert level -- and have just finished 3 or 4 RRT3 scenarios in the last couple of days (British Isles, Coast-to-Coast, East Coast USA) with no particular problems. But I never knew that you had the ability to choose "Expert" for the campaign -- I guess I can go click on "New Campaign" again just to be sure, but it seems you had only 3 choices: Easy, Normal, Hard.

[Gumboots]

Ah, you're right. It's been a while since I played and I'd forgotten it was that way in the campaigns.

Anyway, I found that if not bulldozing Dodoma at the start it made sense to head down the coast first. Just seemed to give me better returns early on than going the other way. Zanzibar is worth trying because you can get a nice CBV boost early on, and by heading to the coast you can also pick up the cheaper tracklaying option from the Masai chief.

[RulerofRails]

Interestingly, I never connected to the chief's village in my "green" attempts at this one when I had just gotten the game. I went to Zanzibar but the steeper route right along the edge of the map. There are many strategies that will be successful here, but this was one of those along with Orient Express that originally made me pay more attention to industries. Must admit I didn't do the bulldoze thing either, but, sure, that's a way to do it that I never thought of. Cliff, good to see some of the early members posting again!

[kingecbert]

My strategy:
bulldoze initial track and station(dodoma). Build a railroad between malindi and Mombasa(massive profits after 1910), in the southeast of the map, wait to improve your credit rating (and for prosperity times), issue bonds and build a textile mill near Juba(3 farms around), and ASAP build a distillery in MOmbasa(lots of sugar near Malindi). i connected tanga and managed to connect Zanzibar in 1909. after that, i expanded to dodoma, and too Tabora.
Tabora has huge amounts of cargo, mainly because of the rivers around, build more industries(breweries, distilleries, meat packing plants, furniture, paper mill near nairobi,...)

Note that weapons are high profitable, MAmbasa(northwest), Kampala, etc... this cities can generate huge profits, and the industry...well, in a map like this one, industry is highly profitable

By the year of 1920 i had more than 60 million in company book value and connected the north of the map(juba and maridi). With this approach you can get gold medal before 1918/1917.

As Gumboots said, zanzibar worth your investment, try to use steel bridge instead of suspension bridge(a little trick near the river), the cost will be 1 mil instead of 2 mil.

the tough part is the beginning, to make your company profitable. After this step, this map is a gold mine.

[Cash on Wheels]

I don't know what it is about this map that makes me feel nogistaic about it. I wish it longer and the objectives more demanding. It has very few events and every play of it I end up laying burn track at the end. Has anyone tried the three maps in the archives that use this map a base for their game? Are they worth it?!