new map: Hellia Empire

[brunom]

Well, if no more comments, that's it - will be issued for archiving soon.

It's time to delete the beta versions in here...

Thanks, as always, for your prompt testing and comments Ray (and others)

B

[Hawk]

Now available in the archives in the Other Lands section.

[belbincolne]

Managed to give this one a try. Loved the scenario even though it was infuriating. Used electric lines from the start and just trains for many years which gave me a slow start but eventually money started rolling in. Was obviously going to get every objective except Weapons with 20 years to go so found the weapons factory and hauled steel and tyres to it - and coal and iron to the steel mill and rubber to the Tyre Factory.

With 15 years left I had every objective except that I hadn't hauled a single weapon. Train to the southern port had 5 so set that off. Other two nil. Then came big reccession for about 7 years and train crashes galore - but had so much money didn't matter - but my share value dropped and being rich I got to own about 80%, Then looked at trains and still the other two had zero - odd - until I saw that the Weapons plant had vanished - should have bought and upgraded it. Had just enough cash to build one with a couple of bonds - and replace all the trains that crashed as someone else has commented. Out of the reccession for just four years and then along came another and I'd zero cash and my credit rating dropped to "C". So for the whole of the forties I had to sit back and watch everything go downhill.

In 4 years I had 20 train crashes and income suffered accordingly. So at the end I got zilch as my Weapons trains for the other 2 ports still had nothing in them - and best would have been Bronze as my PNW halved as the Company went deeper into the red ($5m at the end). Anyway maybe I've learned enough to give it another more successful try??

[brunom]

Seems like terrible bad luck.

Anyway, the gold in Hellia is all about the weapons, so I'm sure you'll do much better on a second attempt, knowing what to expect.

B

[RayofSunshine]

some of the previous threads are very interesting. I am not glad that Bel had that many engine crashes, but does indicate to me, that I am not the only one who has my trains loosing revenue from all the crashes.
I also like the statement about "buying and upgrading" of an industry. I will have to watch that aspect, as there are times of which I am not getting a result for the requirements, only to find that an industry has disappeared.
Never too old to learn something new.
But above all, there is a good concept of the imagination in this scenario, and enjoyed playing it.

[belbincolne]

Yes Ray - if (say) you build a textile mill dependent on a couple of cotton farms nearby it often pays to buy them too in case they disappear - not to mention that the mill might make them more profitable.

[low_grade]

The screen from the autosave on the last year. I was attracted into the Ulantel Highlands not for the rubber but for the logs, built a few related industries up there. Plus it demanded a lot of freight, and created/demanded passengers/mail.

I only played on Hard since I was looking for a good map to just have fun with. Mainly I wanted something which would force me to choose carefully between locos. So early on I ran a couple Eightwheelers for up to 2 cars of passengers in the flats only. Camelbacks for freight and mail on shorter hauls, and Class P8's for the same duty on longer hauls and passengers though grades, both very cheap engines to buy and run. Then started using a few Atlantics for hauling passengers where either there'd be demand for more than 2 cars per trip, or where stations were close enough that the fast acceleration would come in handy, but again not in any serious grades (nothing more than 2 except bridges.) This carried on for a while until I got the H10 which was the engine of choice for mountain duty (lots of 4 grades, some 5, pretty much was able to avoid 6 grades), more expensive to run but faster, and better acceleration and passenger appeal. But not a replacement for the P8 in most applications. Eventually the Northern arrived and finally the Zephyr. Put both to use appropriately, but wasn't tempted to do any wholesale replacement of old engines. As a result I finished the game with 6 different engine types in service (the remaining Eightwheeler was replaced with a Zephyr...), including a 31 year old Camelback which was the lifetime profit leader.

Weapons was the first haulage requirement I golded. Steel Mill in Direppini and rubber in Majindurai plus my lumber from Nirankai (my starting industry) meant I could build a tire factory and weapons factory in Majindurai pretty early on. Finding places on the map with lower prices for alcohol than Imparnoti was the only real challenge, and the last requirement I met. I had a dozen trains losing money at the end, a couple of the Northerns hemorrhaging badly, but somebody had to attend to the haulage goals...

Lots of fun, thanks for the great map Bruno!

And yes, I've been living in tents on Kaua'i and farming and such for the past couple years, but of course I'd come back to RRT3 eventually...

[RayofSunshine]

Brunom,
I somehow missed your thread "last May". So, it being that long ago, I will have to pull up the map and look at the terrain, to see if I can remember my "game plan".