Italy 1946

[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

Italy
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I just started playing the demo and tried playing the Italy campaign but I don't seem to be able to make enough money in order to expand fast enough to connect in the time period. Anyone have any suggestions on how to succeed in this?
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connect the top 4 cities, from venice to turin(sp?), and the port city below turin. This should get you lots of money. Then connect from that port city, whos name i forgot, down towards rome, and on toward palermo as soon as you can afford it.
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How many trains would you make to service the top 4 cites? Would you go electric? Do you recommend spending money on the Station upgrades like the post office, restaurant, hotel etc. I seem to run out of money too quickly. I am unsure as to what the best consist setup is. I have tried just fully automatic and also making a minimum 3 cars to load and am unsure what the best combo is. Also I don't know if I should stretch the water tower and maintenance yards thin or put some between each station. What do you thnk?
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Well, I think i started by connecting Milan to the city east of it. Then i connected To Venice and then i connected the western towns. I think i usually had 1 train service 3 stations & 2 trains doing the same route).
You know, Let one train go from Venice - to milan <- that gives you 3 stops. Then have another train do that from That one Western port city to Milan, that gives you 3 stops. And double all the trains running. So double track the MIlan area, cause 4 trains will be coming to that part (though hopefull not at the same time). Since the area is relatively flat, you only need 2 repair stations & 2 service stations on your track. I went with electric engines. And when you got that setup, try to keep your MOney above 1000k at years end so you can build up the tracks you need to build to palermo when the time comes.
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Agreed, it is important to have good cash at each year-end to get a good track allowance.
Here's a bit of a walkthrough of a game, after several false starts.
I finally got a good start (on medium) with single track and stone bridges connecting Milan, Verona and Venice with serv/maint to the right of the first two cities. Then I studied the charts for the 3 cities and saw that Verona would support one Class 01 from each of the other 2 cities. Milan-Venice would not support a train at all. I set the trains to 3-4 cars.
A couple of years later I expanded to Turin with 1 Class 01 to Milan and one Kriegslok to a cattle ranch.
Then expanded to Bologna-Verona with 1 train and also serviced some grain along the way with 1 train. Then expanded to Venice-Trieste with 1 train to get logs, etc.
At 2/57 I had 7 trains, a logging camp in Yugoslavia, despite having no access rights there, and 3 grain farms.
Connected Rome and Naples with 2 trains and a 3rd servicing produce into Rome. This was a separate line unconnected to my northern line.
Added more trains and double track as warranted, added passenger services on appropriate cities, bought up more industries, added some express trains, etc.
Went away periodically for the excitement of watching paint dry just to get my heart beating again and then shortly before end of game I connected Rome to Grosseto out of pure boredom.
A few years before I would have $30M BV, I started saving cash. At 12/68 I had $6.8M cash, $14.5 industry investments and $30.3 BV so I built burn track from Grosseto to Bologna and from Naples to Palermo with about $2.5M cash left over. I was only running 15 trains including 2 C55 Deltics.
If I built the connecting track earlier instead of some industry buying, I might have made good money off those runs and got an earlier finish. Probably a better strat for a harder level.
Doubt I'll retry on a harder level, too boring and tedious and uncertain for me I think. Also plays like it was developed from rejected ideas from some earlier version of RRT1 or 2, with virtually none of the improvements that were added later. I guess thats the marketing strategy these days though so they can sell an expansion pak.
Anyhow there seems to be enough people who seem to think its the best thing since sliced bread or whatever, to add a grain of salt to my remarks.
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I went Venice to Verona, ran one 8 car train between them.
Then I went Milan, added an 8 car train between Verona and Milan.
Then I went to Turin, added another 8 car train.
Then I went to Trieste from Venice, added another 8 car train.
I think I may have built an industry at some point that was adding 325K/year.
And I just worked my way down the coast. By the time I hit Rome I had more money than I knew what to do with and was limited solely by how much track I could lay.
With modern trains over short flat routes I always run max 8 car trains.
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I did take another shot at this and although I got a win on "easy" I gave up after 15 years on "expert". By 12/60, I had only $5.8M BV on "expert" compared to $14.5M BV on "easy". Just couldn't make money fast enough to go anywhere. The map wasn't as good but I don't think it was that much worse.
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As every1 has said connect the top four cities but then look for primary resources that aren't being used....
Livestock southwest of Venice - build a meat packing plant in Venice
Grain south of Turin - build a brewery in Turin
Iron north of Milan - Coal in Yugo - but the steel factory in Venice.
Always built only in January....
Only built to a point where you will have 1,500K in you account by Dec 31 at least.
I used the fast electrics (EE-88 I think) - 8 cars - routing is important - bought 2 trains off the bat and routed from Venice to the three other cities and then from Turin to the three other cities - use Hub and spoke model.
If you own industry have one train to go to pick up raw material AND distrbute goods (note: you have to find profitable routes here, do not set a minimun load or your train may get stuck as prices get adjusted).
I won gold with 14 years left and build one massive suspension bridge to Palmero which was mighty cool!
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My problem is my money is gone after laying track between the top 3 or 4 cites, build stations, add a few trains, add water towers and maintenance. It seems I can't generate enough income to buy industries. The Scenario starts without too much money. The trains don't seem to find that much profit traveling between the cities. (not enough cargo I guess)
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I did Milan-Turin. Then added Verona - Venice.
Generated a lot of money.
I did not get any luck starting at Rome.
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I made gold on hard. Started in the northern Po valley with Venice-Verona, then Milano, then Triest, then Bologna and Torino(need bridges). Made tons of cash until I had ca. $5000K. Then connected Rome over Firenze. Then profitable Rome-Naples-Salerno. When collected $5000k again I built a long track to Palermo and won. Owned fruit and other farms.
Probably it's better to make the Rome-Naples connection before crossing the mountains.
This scenario is both in the retail version and in the demo.
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I have started this map (Italy 1946 scenario) a couple of time, but I can't get a hang on the strategy to use. The problem is that I need cash to get track and I need track or industry to get cash.
I'm usually a aggressive builder and tend to lay track and/or buy industry early and often, but this strategy doesn't really work here.
Should I make an initial investement to get the cast coming in and then wait until my cash reserves builds up or should I invest aggressively in industry and disregard the track awards for some years?
BTW, is it the right strategy to electrify on this map?
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Haven't tried this map myself yet, so I can only speak in terms of general strategy, but electrification tends to be expensive, so if you're squeezed for cash you might want to go without - at least for the time being. On the other hand, electric engines tend to be generally more effective than any other engines, so if you can afford it and you're looking more than just a couple of years down the road, it could be worth the extra track building and maintenance costs.
I tend to be an aggressive builder also, and I tend to like going electric whenever possible. However, there have been times when I have found myself unable to make it work in the early stages of a "slow starting" scenario.
Going non-electric first and then switching to electric at a later time will always be more expensive than going electric right away, so if you're going to do it at all it's usually a good idea to do it right from the start. But some times you just don't have the cash on hand to pull it off.
I might have to try this scenario and see what I can make of it.
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Is the Italy scenario in the retail version the same one as in the Demo? In the Demo, you must connect Milan, Venice, Rome, and Palermo and have CBV of $30M within 25 years to get the gold, and there are no AIs to get in the way. Is this the same as in the retail version? If so I have made Gold on Expert level and would be glad to share my insights/strategies.
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wrote: Is the Italy scenario in the retail version the same one as in the Demo? In the Demo, you must connect Milan, Venice, Rome, and Palermo and have CBV of $30M within 25 years to get the gold, and there are no AIs to get in the way. Is this the same as in the retail version? If so I have made Gold on Expert level and would be glad to share my insights/strategies.
I haven't got the demo and the Gigex webpage that the link leads to seems viral. But, I can tell that at least the goal is the same. Has the demo version the Marshall Plan?
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I've found this scenario quite variable; my best game started with industry. You get the track based on revenue...no need to lay track at all
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Following is my note on How to get Gold for this one:
Scenario Seven: Italy Connect Rome Milan Venice & Palermo with a Company B V in 25 years. Limited track & no bonds allowed
Getting CBV high enough is the hardest part. You have four initial choices. Track –25%, Trains –25%, Loading 25% faster, Locos up 1 level. I chose track and think this was wise. I just went west from Venice to connect the big towns along the plain and made lots of money with just one train and then two. I never had any worries about having sufficient track and when I was flush went down the west coast to Pisa and Florence and then south-east via the large towns to Rome adding in a line to the towns south of Venice double tracking the Venice-Milan line. Double track from Rome to Naples and put two trains straight on. That little line is a gold mine! When I had $8m I just connected direct to Palermo. This will never repay its cost – its best just to hang on until you’ve got your CBV and only then build it. I used diesel throughout and the best train I could afford. I built a brewery in Rome which was only so so. Wouldn’t do it again.
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I am keen on hearing your approach on this scenario.
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He's probably forgotten since he made that statement over 4 months ago
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Yes, it has been a while since I played that scenario. The thing I remember most is that demand gets saturated very fast, so you need to keep expanding your railroad once you start building it. What I wound up doing was to buy up the most profitable Dairy Farms right at the outset. These give very good return on investment. I think I had enough left over after buying three of them to also buy a Grain Farm. Then I just sat back and used the profits to buy more industries. I didn't start building a railroad until 1953 or 1954; then connected Milan-Verona-Venice with double track and started running trains. Eventually added Turin and Genoa to the Milan end, and connected to Bologna from Venice. Built through the mountains to Florence and then to Rome and Naples. Also ran track from Genoa-Pisa-Florence. You can't do this all at once because of the trackbuilding limit, but the 5 yrs. or so with no track-building at the start gives you a pretty good reserve of track sections. Didn't go out to Sicily until I had more than 6 million in cash, and only built when other goals had been met. This was just "burn track" and I never ran any trains on it.
I also did it starting with track and trains, but it takes a lot longer to build up cash reserves, and the yearly track-building limit gets in the way, as does the quick saturation of demand between cities, so I would suggest starting with industry for the first few years. Also don't forget to keep adding to your industry portfolio when you have the cash, either by buying existing ones or building your own. Fruit Orchards are also a pretty good investment if you get them when they're only a year or two old, and can really make a good return if you build a Distillery near them.
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I played the scenario too, won gold on hard difficulty and I did like the scenario. I do not really like the "industry game", thus I played the scenario only with railroad operations and didn't buy a single industry.
What I noticed however is that the starting location of your iron and (especially) coal mines is important. You will have difficulties winning the game when you don't have a coal mine in Italy. There are usually a couple of coal mines in the Balkan countries but you don't have access rights there to lay track and there's usually also enough demand for coal there so that you cannot get the coal to Italy where you have enough iron mines and steel mills.
Restart the scenario until you have a coal mine in Italy (it spawns just North of Milan where you have iron mines too) so that you can transport coal, iron, steel and cars right from the beginning. Usually you get rubber from the port in Venice and then you get a tire factory in Trieste and that's all you need for a nice transport business.
I connected the cities in the North first, with electrified track right from the beginning (Venice, Verona, Milan, Trieste, Torino), then I worked south from Venice to Bologna, Florence and Rome. After that you're almost set for a gold medal.
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Firstly thanks for the reactions, secondly my apologies for my not-so-good-English!
I am a new player to the game (demo version) and just ran some tests with both industry and rail investments. Seems to me they are both profitable. However at this moment my preference goes out to rail; I just like to see these trains running
Just restarted and now I am setting it up with a connection Turin-Milan-Verona. I'll keep you posted on my results
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One of the great things I have found out about the net is all the people from different countries that play.
Never be ashamed of your English. I personally think you have a very good grasp on the language. In fact, I think that you write better than some people who are native in the tongue.
The other thing I have found on these boards is how everybody is always ready and eager to help out.
Personally, I use the business first, but, like you, I love to watch the trains run.
The important point is, have fun! That's what it's all about, right?
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I took two classes in Nederlands ten years ago in anticipation of a possible contract with the Netherland Air Force. Never happened and the only thing I remember is "Do da door dicht" and "Do da door open".
I never need an apology from ANYONE that can speak more languages than I - which is only 2, Engilish and Okie!
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wrote: I never need an apology from ANYONE that can speak more languages than I - which is only 2, Engilish and Okie!
Okie?
I can speak English, Spanish, French, a few German words.
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I think that Venice is a good city to connect to. You don't need a bridge to Triest or Verona. It's important to build the loss generating lines in the south of Italy(the Mezzogiorno) at the end of the scenario.
There is a lot of iron and steel in Yugoslavia that will cost you precious track but it's fun to get the economy really running.
EDIT: style and spelling improved
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I loved that map, mainly because I played it from the demo and could beat on hard in my sleep.
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Agree broadly with most above on strategy.
Getting 30m book value is probalby the most arduos thing so I bought industry with my extra 2-3 m/year, (love to get auto's going if possible) in the early 60's after connecting most of Yugoslavia.
As in a lot of scenarios buying dairy's straightaway helps heaps(usually can get 100-400k/year from the start.In boom times you will get up to 50-60% profit on your investment. But I'm not biased against a distillery/furniture/textile properly sited.
Connecting to Palermo I guessed was a dead loss so connected only at the death from Salerno.
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The Italy Scenario took a few tries but remember the limitations.
Limited track - based on available cash.
Limited supply of cargo.
Here goes - year 1 do nothing and I mean nothing. Speed the game to very fast. This ensures you still have the same amount of Cash + interest. Additionally you are given maximum allowance of track. The next 2 years build industry. Normally Breweries, Distilleries. Also if there is a Logging Camp build a Lumber Mill.
Because you'll be cash strapped the track you'll get is minimal during this time.
After year 3 start laying track up the hill from the coast to Milan using the best hill climber and maximum cars. Your Industry will go the ports and the ports will supply. The 1st couple of years usually mean 1 train for 3 cities due to under supply until you get them going.
After that lay track like mad all the way to Rome and Sicilly. Just make sure that you have enough cash to get the maximum track allowance at the year end. If there's a risk - don't build it - wait till January.
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The above achieved Gold on Expert in 22 years

[low_grade]

As you can tell from the extensive postings above, this scenario is not very difficult to win through a variety of strategies, so I'm just going to add my two bits about why I liked it.

First and most of all, the early game can be quite challenging, without quite being tedious. I even followed a couple of my trains around and manually routed them to maximize on profits. It's super important to have as much cash as you can at the end of the year, and of course track is limited, which together make the early game one to play carefully.

Second, it's a scenario which highlights electric engines. I went with 25% off track rather than 25% off engines or +1 acceleration and reliability or 40% faster load/unload times, and this of course made electric even better. It kind of sucked getting the Deltic towards the end, though, since I had to conclude that it was simply much better than the engines I was running and so instantly replaced them all.

And last of all, it's a quick play, with the last 6-8 years breezing by on very fast, so you can see the results of your early careful gameplay all in one sitting I would imagine.

I certainly didn't have a problem making CBV, and I did dabble in industries. Went into Yugoslavia, of course. Did a lot of double tracking early in the game, and I think this is a good idea since your early track will be your most profitable track by far throughout the scenario, so make it efficient, too. If you're careless and try to expand too much and never have more than $700K at the end of the year, I can see how you might have a tough time getting enough track to connect down to Palermo by the end of the game, but really this is a secondary consideration. Just focus on finding a way to be profitable, and to get your income over $1M per year.

[Gumboots]

This has always been one of my favourite scenarios. There's just something cool about Italy, and when a friend told me it was impossible to get gold with steam I just had to prove him wrong.

Story is that it is definitely possible to get gold, with all steam*, on Expert setting. In fact on a good map you can top $50,000,000 CBV with steam, and get every Italian town connected to a genuine service with reasonable grades. It takes a bit of doing, and it means Yugoslavia is out of the question, but it's possible.

One thing I haven't heard mentioned is the Sardinia-Corsica run. It took me ages to find this one and I wonder how many other people have found it. Corsica has absolutely no industry or resources, but it has a lot of very thirsty Corsicans. Access rights are only $100K. Sardinia usually has lots of produce and alcohol, but no real market for either. The result is that by the 1960's, Sardinia is usually swimming in alcohol and produce at rock bottom prices. If you wait until the 1960's, it's not uncommon for there to be a $200 price difference for alcohol between Sassari and Bonifacio. You already have access to Sardinia as it's part of Italy.

Spend $100K for access to Corsica and put stations and track to suit. Your first load from Sassari to Bonifacio can net you $1.5 million for a very short and easy run. Send the train straight back to Sassari, then lay track down to Cagliari. You probably wont make anything on the trip down, but you'll come back with more booze. Unfortunately, it wont be worth much more in Sassari than you paid for it, but it will stll be worth heaps in Bonifacio. Go get those Corsicans drunk. When you land the second load in Bonifacio, there should be a healthy price difference up to Calvi. Lay track up there and send a load of booze up.

What I've found is that this run will pay for its stations, track, etc almost immediately, and then stabilise to a nice little earner that will haul in around 200K/year. It's a nice little dodge.

*Oh yeah, if you do decide you're bonkers enough to be running all steam in Italy up to 1970, you want Kriegsloks. They're cheap, they're reliable, they're acceptable to passengers, and they go up hills. You can't get them past 1967 IIRC, so I often stockpile a few extra ones just before then.

Mallards are expensive to buy and to run, useless on any grade at all, not very reliable, and slow down rapidly unless lightly loaded. Class 01's are a lovely unit and very reliable, but still a bit pricey to buy and run and only really like flat country. Use a couple for express only on the flat if you want to. Challengers are grunty like nothing else, but keeping them running will drain your wallet. I only buy a Challenger if it's almost the end of the game and I can't get a Kriegslok any more.

[RulerofRails]

I love this scenario too. Has a nice clean, simple feel. Good strategy, among the best for scenarios that use limited track.

Have played it many times in the past. After a recent replay I took a look in the editor, since I always thought the wording of the election results hinted at a possible consequence.

Turns out there are two random events (taxes) that have improper variable logic. They will never fire. The effects are 4 months of +20% company overhead or 4 months of -20% cargo production, depending on which party wins an election. There is a variable set when you start the company that renders them inactive. This could have been an intentional disable. I can fix them, just not sure how much they will add to the game though. Probably not worth putting up a separate file for something so small.

ETA: Managed to build a Steel bridge across the strait. Like this:

Lately, I've discovered a trick to laying track close to the ocean. The finest edge of the water is always dictated by the small squares. When I aim my track lay to just clear the corner of the water cells, I have been astonishing myself about what is possible. I switched to editor mode so you can get a better idea of what I mean. Notice how close I got to the water cells, passing very close to the corners.

Here's an idea of the grades. Next time I think I can improve the corner off the bridge, grades are low, but it's a bit too tight.

[kamyFC]

Played this scenario in September 2021 and really struggled initially. Florence is my favorite Italian city and I wanted to make it work from there! Unfortunately there is nothing much happening in Tuscany in this map, so i had to loose twice. Then I restarted and connected Milan - Verona - Venice. Make a straight line track avoiding bridges and using electrified tracks. The Class E 18 electric locomotive really shines in this mission, with its "very good" reliability and "average" acceleration and decent speeds on grades, i did not bother using any other train here! Then watch the money pouring in.
Connect Triste and Turin and you have 5 stops and 8 trains that give you huge money.

Then you connect Milan to Genoa and further hugging the coast line and avoiding the mountainous terrain, we connect to Florence. Once you have trains running on the Florence-Genoa-Milan route and making lots of money.
Now you need to make another line hugging the coast from Genoa to Rome and to Naples. By now as there is so much demand for goods due to your network, all the trains in the new route too will generate huge money.
The Roma to Milan train generated $540K in one trip which was a record (for me!)

Finally with the all cash, lay the electrified track from Naples all the way towards the Island of Sicily and make a spectacular cantilever bridge towards Palermo.
That was great fun.


Finally Gold!


Thanks all for documenting people's experiences since the early 2000's. It is great to read up on how people tackled these missions 20 years ago
This site is like a time machine!

[Gumboots]

That's a different way of doing it. I might have this play this one again.

[RulerofRails]

This is my favorite out of the original scenarios. Nevertheless it isn't "perfect." Florence city placement is problematic. Often there is a cliff incorporated in the town. Some buildings are high and some are low. This is a problem to get rails in and out nicely, or even where to place your station. The surrounding land is also not friendly for the placement of farms and the like. Another thing is the river. In RT3 bridges are a bit tempremental to find "smart" placements. Mechanically, from the perspective of price topography it is also a poor location. It has a big demand shadow from the mountains to the north. Prices tend to drop off once even a little cargo is present, going easily below what a good A-B-C linear transmission pattern should be. It would be useful as a production location, but the seeding recipe doesn't have many chances to have a useful conversion of local resources when they are present.

The Bologna-San Marino-Perugia-Rome is the preferred route in the game. There are some subtleties with track laying where you can do the whole thing at 4% or less grade. The demand transmission is good and it connects the main valley more directly with Rome. This direct connection is also a boon for express traffic especially if you build Hotels.

My first instinct about where to run a railway based on the topography was the same as yours: follow the coast line down from Genoa. The game's demo had this map, and I did a dozen or so plays using this route. I did a quick check on wikipedia and a connection from Bologna to Florence was made in real life before the one from Genoa was completed. I have no idea if the mountain range in the game is overstated or perhaps the real life route made use of a few tunnels? I guess back in the day the coastal route was less interesting because the world relied a lot more on local shipping than today.

[kamyFC]

This is my favorite out of the original scenarios. Nevertheless it isn't "perfect." Florence city placement is problematic. Often there is a cliff incorporated in the town. Some buildings are high and some are low. This is a problem to get rails in and out nicely, or even where to place your station. The surrounding land is also not friendly for the placement of farms and the like. Another thing is the river. In RT3 bridges are a bit tempremental to find "smart" placements. Mechanically, from the perspective of price topography it is also a poor location. It has a big demand shadow from the mountains to the north. Prices tend to drop off once even a little cargo is present, going easily below what a good A-B-C linear transmission pattern should be. It would be useful as a production location, but the seeding recipe doesn't have many chances to have a useful conversion of local resources when they are present.

The Bologna-San Marino-Perugia-Rome is the preferred route in the game. There are some subtleties with track laying where you can do the whole thing at 4% or less grade. The demand transmission is good and it connects the main valley more directly with Rome. This direct connection is also a boon for express traffic especially if you build Hotels.

My first instinct about where to run a railway based on the topography was the same as yours: follow the coast line down from Genoa. The game's demo had this map, and I did a dozen or so plays using this route. I did a quick check on wikipedia and a connection from Bologna to Florence was made in real life before the one from Genoa was completed. I have no idea if the mountain range in the game is overstated or perhaps the real life route made use of a few tunnels? I guess back in the day the coastal route was less interesting because the world relied a lot more on local shipping than today.

Agreed. Very little happening in the Florence area in terms of industry. Also the terrain is wonky out there! But the map is sort of correct. Florence has mountains on 3 sides and a valley that leads to Pisa on the coast.
Milan-Bologna-San Marino-Perugia-Rome is a nice route. All large-medium towns in that route and you are guaranteed to generate revenue.
I usually try to take scenic routes Hugging the coast is fun and Genoa route is very interesting. I have driven on that route - The Italian Riviera near Genoa is stunning. Then you enter Tuscany and go down towards Rome.
What a country! Wish there are more Italian maps. Thanks again for responding and being huge part of this community. Loving it.

[Gumboots]

What a country! Wish there are more Italian maps.

There is Italian Toymakers, and Sicily, but I have not played either of those myself.

[Gumboots]

By the way...

I did a quick check on wikipedia and a connection from Bologna to Florence was made in real life before the one from Genoa was completed. I have no idea if the mountain range in the game is overstated or perhaps the real life route made use of a few tunnels?

The first line over the Appenines was the Porrettana:

At the time it was an enormous engineering project with its 47 tunnels and 35 bridges and viaducts, with a total length of 99 km.

By the time of the Italy 1946 scenario, the Porrettana had been relegated to local traffic only, and the new main line was the Bologna–Florence direttissima:

It was Italy's greatest engineering achievement in the first half of the twentieth century. When it opened in 1934 it significantly shortened the old winding Porrettana line over the Apennines via Pistoia, and was made possible by the 18.507 km-long Apennine Base Tunnel.

This line also has the Monte Adone tunnel (7.111 km) and the Pian di Setta tunnel (3.052 km). So yes, a little bit of tunneling was involved, on both lines.

Obviously in RT3 the usual thing is to avoid tunnels, but if you wanted to be more realistic in this scenario you would bore straight through most of the Appenines.

[RulerofRails]

Thanks for digging around into the history of this. If Florence topograhpy was "corrected", especially the river banks, a tunnel may be practical on this map also. Still one would probably have to incentivize the build with some cheaper tunneling costs or something.

[Gumboots]

It may still be difficult because of the small scale. Would have to try it and see. I've attached a basic route map, with the major stations, and with the tunnels shown as green lines.

[Gumboots]

I haven't played with the tunnelling incentive idea yet*, but just for the heck of it I started playing this scenario again yesterday, using the west coast route suggested by kamyFC.

Seems to work well. The coast between Genoa and Pisa is a bit rough, but I just laid the best track possible, then used the editor to adjust a few vertices to get rid of the nasty kicks in the track, while leaving the overall gradients much the same. What I found is that since by the time you can connect Pisa there is a fair amount of production in the Venice-Milan region, you can run a big stack-and-dump as the first loads to Pisa. In my case it was four train loads of Clothing at around $60k/load, which is a good earner.

The same loads can then be hauled straight to Florence for another nice (albeit much smaller) earnings boost. Since I was already at Florence, I then went to Perugia, and then from there to Rome, which is where I left it for yesterday. Situation in January 1955 is that I have CBV of around $14 million, with Trieste, Venice, Verona, Milan, Turin, Genoa, Pisa, Florence, Perugia and Rome all hooked up on one long line. No other side connections anywhere, and don't appear to need them. It's clear I can romp it in from here, in terms of the actual scenario goals.

This is obviously playing on Expert level, with steam only. For a change, I skipped the cheaper track option at the start. Track cost does not seem to be a problem, even at standard price, but then I'm not using electric track.

Instead, I chose the increased reliability and acceleration for locos. Handy when using Kriegsloks, since by default they are a bit slow to accelerate, and the extra reliability is always handy too. You can skip a caboose and just haul max loads without worrying.

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In terms of industry, I bought a Lumber Mill in Verona at the start of the game, since it had a decent supply and no competition. This has been a useful addition to earnings up until 1955. Another Lumber Mill has recently seeded at Trieste, so I expect earnings from the Verona mill will drop off, but it is still worth keeping since the scenario goals are only CBV and connections (and selling the mill would incur a CBV loss).

I built a Tool & Die in Venice a year or two back (can't remember exactly when, offhand). That's doing well, via a seeded Plastics Factory which eats Oil from the Venice port, and also the modest Aluminum production from the same port.

Apart from that, I have hotels and post offices in Venice, Verona, Milan and Turin. The hotels are averaging around 15%/year ROI, and of course boost pax traffic a bit. The post offices make their usual -$1k loss per year, but provide a slight boost to mail traffic. Modest earnings, but useful in both cases.

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Now that I am at January 1955 I have a range of options. Short term exploitation of unused resources in Sicily is one, with no rail required for a few years (always worth checking). Hooking up Yugoslavia for a massive boost to Steel production is another. Or, I could go down the coast, from Rome to Naples, and pick up the haulage there. Not sure which one I will try next. Might try all three, just to see what happens.

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Re tunnel incentives: with standard track cost, it costs around $3.3 million to do a decent "Apennines Base Tunnel" connected to Florence. Anything less than that amount just gives you crappy grades at the entrance and exit, but for that price you can get something really good. I'm not sure if it's worth trying to incentivise such a tunnel, or if it should be left as a luxury for those who have got enough cash together to afford it. If someone chooses the 25% cheaper track option at the start of the game they will be getting a substantial discount on such a tunnel anyway (tunnel price would be reduced to about $2.5 million).

[Gumboots]

While considering options, I realised some things about this map that I hadn't bothered thinking of before.

1/ The Venice port that is supposed to produce Aluminum from Clothing will not produce much in practice, unless you deliberately engineer a massive glut of Clothing at Venice. That would be the only way of making the conversion minimally profitable. Usually there is more value in hauling some of the Clothing somewhere else, with the result that Aluminum production at Venice is negligible even if there are a stack of loads of Clothing sitting there. The price of Clothing is simply too high for the conversion to work.

2/ The same applies to the conversion of Grain to Iron. IOW, for both conversions it looks like PopTop made the beginner's error of setting up conversions that can never be used in practice.

3/ The map is obviously set up to encourage you to go into Yugoslavia, so you can get Iron and Coal moving to where they will do some good. That will enable plenty of Steel production, but then what do you use the Steel for?

Automobiles production is obviously intended to be a big thing, given the number of Auto Plants that seed, but Rubber is limited to 2 loads/year from Venice, which means ditto for Tires, which means ditto for Automobiles. There is some other Rubber produced way down south, but in practice it's usually not worth worrying about. There's not produced and there's too much else going on.

Again, this looks like a beginner's error: making lots of Auto Plants (and potentially lots of Steel) but without enough rubber for them to do anything much.

The result is that even if you do go into Yugoslavia and start getting lots of Steel produced, it's only useful for supplying a Tool & Die. It will cost you about $2 million to get access to Yugoslavia and start doing anything with it, and there's not a lot of return on offer. Upshot is that Yugoslavia is only worth looking at later in the game, if you have stacks of cash and want something else to do.

Edit: Turns out I forgot a detail here. Yes, the usable Rubber production is minimal. However, since Steel production is also minimal in the early years, Tires get a chance to build up a bit. This means that if you do hook up Yugoslavia later, and start evening out the distribution of Coal and Iron, the boost to Steel production combined with the stockpile of Tires does allow reasonable Auto Plant production for a while, along with allowing increased production of Goods.

4/ The Steel Mill at Naples is always useless, because in reality you'll never bother hauling Iron and Coal that far. It's far more sensible to just utilise the mills at Milan.

Short version: although this map plays well on the whole, some aspects of it are only useful as an example of what not to do.

[Gumboots]

Ended up getting an easy win in January 1963 (just needed that last track allowance to hook up Palermo) with CBV of $38.8 million. Went into Yugoslavia a couple of years before, just because getting down south needs a lot of track, and there's not much money in it. I think Yugoslavia is actually reasonably profitable once you have the cash and the network to utilise it. There was enough Iron and Coal around to keep Milan and Ljubljana ticking over, once it was evenly distributed. Only hooked up Ljubljana and Zagreb though. I had too much else on to be bothered going further into Yugoslavia.

I did Florence like this. Works well. Excellent coverage and reasonable grades.

I had double tracked the line from Turin to Venice earlier in the game, and if I had skipped that I could have got Gold in 1962. Also could have skipped Catanzaro to save a bit of track, but not sure if that is worth doing. Anyway, Gold in 1962* is definitely possible.

Not sure how much faster it could be done. It may be possible to get Gold in 1960*, if you're a bit cunning and a bit lucky.

*(with normal track price, and steam locos only, on Expert setting)

[RulerofRails]

The seeding you had may not be representative. The randomization is quite good: I just had a seed with no Iron at all. I had another with both ports seeding into Venice. In my experience I remember seeing the "Rome" port there more often than the "Venice" one, and very rarely both. As a tycoon game, I like to hope that we are factoring in economics, in terms of what best serves the entire map economy. From this perspective the Florence - Bologna section rarely makes sense. We don't need a tunnel at all for good grades, if we build a station on the high ground in Florence.

*The 6's in Bologna are thanks to me not building the station before the track there.

The trick to getting a high bridge is to lay from the south bank, and just touch the ugly bump (it has a steep side for smooth bridge transition), this will prevent the game from sagging the build. But the high station in Florence is not ideal, being slightly "isolated" from the real industrial action. In short, resource delivery to factories there is impeded.

For sure the port recipes are somewhat "for show", you didn't mention the least profitable one: Alcohol -> Oil. Perhaps you had a rich seed of Iron and Coal. Next time you may have significantly less. Take a look at the other industrial buildings, Brewery, Distillery, or Textile Mill. To me it's "part of the game" that more seed than are needed (3x needed on average).

It's possible to do it at the start of the 12th year with a decent seed, running steamers, no industries. I believe I used a suspension bridge to avoid building on the arch of Italy. My hold-up is CBV. Yugoslavia is for CBV. I look to go there fairly early. The Trieste-Venice-Bologna start is my preferred. Quite often a Lumber Mill in Bologna. So Logs-Lumber and frequently Rubber-Tire are the staples. Sometimes even Steel trickle can be grabbed in Trieste.

Once in Yugoslavia, I will try to produce Steel at Ljubljana, this way I get to haul each load for at least $60k, up to $90k. That's good money.

Of the start options, remember that acceleration is broken. Track is limited. Engines are cheap. Station turnaround in this period isn't too bad. In the long term it's between station turnaround and reliability. Because of the requirement to have cash saved at year end, I'm still tempted to take the cheap track. Because it may enable me to get max track earlier than otherwise.

[Gumboots]

Cheap track is the no-brainer option for the quickest win, but this time I deliberately avoided it, just for something different.

And I never do the suspension bridge from Naples stunt, just because it looks ridiculous to me. I always build down south, then cross the strait at the narrowest place, just to get something that feels more or less realistic.

That line to Florence is a good dodge, but in reality you'd never be able to lay track that easily. Well spotted, though.

[TheBonobo4]

Played this one last night, and got Gold on Expert in May 1965, a few years before the 1971 deadline. This is what my company track map looked like at the game end. I had entirely Electric track, and used Kriegslok and E18 locomotives. Kriegslok are cheap, good all-rounders, whilst E18s are fast, reliable, and good for passengers (though I didn't get that many, my freight income was around 3x my express income).



It wasn't a very difficult scenario. I did buy into Yugoslavia quite early on, and connected Trieste up to Ljubljana, Zagreb, and Banja Luka, then hauled (I think) Lumber, Steel, and Furniture to Italy for good profits. Definitely worth doing, there was good money to be made in Yugoslavia. Also, as was said before, Southern Italy didn't have much, so once I connected Naples and its nearby city (Salerno possibly?) to Palermo, I basically forgot about anything South of Naples and concentrated up North. Though I did connect one city in the South of Italy, whose name I cannot remember. I connected Palermo with around $20M CBV, and I therefore got Gold with almost exactly $30M CBV, I owned some industries and farms, and a few Hotels (not profitable, but they might have helped create some passengers etc). I did go for cheaper track at the start, and it definitely seems like the best option overall.

I recorded the whole playthrough, for anyone interested it is below. It is just under 2 hours in total, at 1h 46m.
https://youtu.be/l37tnRnebyg