Spent three hours trying to figure out the scoring in that new train game

Got the new train game, 'Iron Rails of the West', last weekend. The rulebook looked simple enough, maybe 12 pages. But the scoring section was a mess. It said to add points for connected cities, then subtract for unused track, then multiply by some bonus cards. My group and I just sat there, passing the book around. We must have set the game up and scored it wrong four times. Each time we got a totally different winner. We finally had to look up a video online from the designer himself. Turns out we missed that you only score the longest continuous route, not all of them. What a waste of a game night. Has anyone else had a game where the scoring rules were just broken?

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3 Comments

lane.joel6mo ago

Blame the editors, not the game.

4

jennifer3586mo ago

Wait you scored ALL the routes at first? lmao no wonder it took forever, that sounds like a nightmare. I can't believe the rulebook was that bad for a game with only 12 pages. We had a similar meltdown over a different game where the scoring example in the book was just wrong. It completely ruins the whole night when you can't trust the rules.

2

tylerg306mo ago

Oh man, Jennifer358, it was even worse than that. The rulebook didn't just say to score all routes, it buried the real rule in a tiny footnote on the last page. We wasted an hour before someone spotted it. That kind of mistake makes you want to just put the game away for good.

2