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Walls come down (original campaign)


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I have a ton of trouble getting a good start and winning this map. Funny thing is a long time ago I got the gold on this map but now I'm lucky to get the bronze. As I said my main problem is figuring out the best way to start. The difficulty really ramps up on the modern maps. Trains are expensive! for one thing. Do you set up passengers line early? I've tried to do that and it hasn't worked out. Concentrating on industry early also gives me no joy.

any tips for this scenario?

thx

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IDo you set up passengers line early? I've tried to do that and it hasn't worked out. Concentrating on industry early also gives me no joy.

any tips for this scenario?

As usual, PAX pay much better than industry throughout the game.  All those industries are a bit of a red herring IMHO.

And there is one reliably good start for this map, and it's an international one.

DJF

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Mind cluing me in. :) I just can't for the life of me make money early on this map. The trains are expensive, the maintenance on modern trains are high so the more not necessarily the merrier and the interest rate on bonds are high so if I borrow money early the interest rate kills me.

Tough map for me... :(

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Mind cluing me in. :) I just can't for the life of me make money early on this map. ...

Tough map for me... :(

I spent a lot of time on this map when I was learning the game.  One of the nice things about it is the Eurostar becomes a great engine later in the game.

But the key to it is a good start.  You need 2 trains and a reasonable length between 2 large enough cities.  The problem is the cities within Poland are too close to support 2 trains.

So my solution is to link the best city in Poland (that's random) with a Lithuania (where a well placed station can span 2 cities and have 7 or 8 houses).

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An important thing to do in this scenario is to make sure you only send cargo to stations where demand is high. Level 3 demand for passengers and 4 for mail otherwise your trains only break even or lose money.

Industry will make you more money but you must only ship where demand is close to maximum. also trains are  quite fast so 1 train can cover alot of ground. Use electrics.

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Thx for the replies!

I went with diesel all the way and just barley made it to the gold. I must have had about 30 FP45 diesels w/ 3 or 4 cars running my long passenger routes and they weren't that great... I'm sure it would have been much easier with electrics. The key for me was getting a good start, I just barely had enough money  at the beginning to buy it, but like djf01suggested, I bought territory in Lithuania and ran a line from Lodz (poland) to Vilnius and Kaunas (joined by one large station). And that gave me a very good start. From the profits of that run I should have then only built electric rail from then on but I didn't and made it harder then it should have been.

Anyway thx for the help.

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Here is a small amount detail about the one and zero train solutions not included in the fewest trains thread. It seems likely the critical path here is getting the required PNW.

With 1 train, starting 1/1991, connected Poznan and Warsaw, then expanded to Minsk asap.

Started with an SD45 and with a robbery and a crash, replaced it probably mid-1996 with a Dash-9. Kept Diesel as manager throught.

By 12/2007, company had $12M cash, no bonds outstanding, probably waiting on the required PNW. Connected the required cities with burn track and AI track where available and built the required stations on my or AI track, again where available, for gold.

For the zero-train scenario, connected Poznan-Lodz-Warsaw with first company, then created a second company right away, the boss company, to control it.

Then created another company in 1993 connecting Wroclaw-L'viv-Kiev and slaved it to the boss company. Got into a little trouble when they connected Krakow, but was able to bulldose and rebuild to fix things up well enough to keep them off the new route they inadvertantly created for the other cities. The 2 slave companies were running 5 and 4 trains respectively.

As above, with no bonds outstanding, gold 12/1996 after buying up all outstanding stock to get a high enough PNW for the year-end.

Attached is a post-gold picture of some of the layout detail and the burn track for the zero-train scenario.

post-30-1303071587242_thumb.jpg

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  • 3 years later...

sorry to resurrect an older thread, but I wanted to say that I'm also stuck on this (seems a huge increase in difficulty compared to the previous ones, prices just skyrocket and passengers aren't nearly as plentiful anymore).

I'll try what you guys are suggesting, thank you for the ideas - and I wish I were able to download/view the zero_train.jpg file, but for some reason I get permission denied when I try it (and the contact administrator link doesn't work, either...).

anyway, thank you for the suggestions!

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Here is a small amount detail about the one and zero train solutions not included in the fewest trains thread. It seems likely the critical path here is getting the required PNW.

With 1 train, starting 1/1991, connected Poznan and Warsaw, then expanded to Minsk asap.

Started with an SD45 and with a robbery and a crash, replaced it probably mid-1996 with a Dash-9. Kept Diesel as manager throught.

By 12/2007, company had $12M cash, no bonds outstanding, probably waiting on the required PNW. Connected the required cities with burn track and AI track where available and built the required stations on my or AI track, again where available, for gold.

For the zero-train scenario, connected Poznan-Lodz-Warsaw with first company, then created a second company right away, the boss company, to control it.

Then created another company in 1993 connecting Wroclaw-L'viv-Kiev and slaved it to the boss company. Got into a little trouble when they connected Krakow, but was able to bulldose and rebuild to fix things up well enough to keep them off the new route they inadvertantly created for the other cities. The 2 slave companies were running 5 and 4 trains respectively.

As above, with no bonds outstanding, gold 12/1996 after buying up all outstanding stock to get a high enough PNW for the year-end.

Attached is a post-gold picture of some of the layout detail and the burn track for the zero-train scenario.

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I found this on an old website of how someone else did this

"I won easily on this one because of some gutsy moves in the beginning. I had played a few times and struggles with passengers in Poland. If you try to stay in Poland you won't make any money on passengers. I thought Munich would offer a good line between there and Warsaw but the Black Sea always had a base there. So I started the campaign with the idea of merging with them. I didn't worry about my company except for a line east from Warsaw to Poznan. I had only 1 train sending passengers. I purchased as much stock as I could in Black Sea buying heavily on margin. As soon as I had about a million and a half in cash I attempted a merger with Black Sea I was about a million short so I took out about 3 more bonds I had 5 total. So after selling all but 51% of Black Sea I was able to sucussfully merger. Doing this caused my purchasing power to go way up. Well since I was so focused on merging I didn't run my company very well. The stock was down to $9 a share. I bought them all and started managing well. I had over 20 Million in just a few short years."

I think I try to do this one with electric trains, long time since I played it but I have got gold on hard. You need to get off to a good start with this one and restart if there are no good cities on the map you can connect.

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Wow, I didn't expect anywhere near as much help and responses to an old thread! I appreciate it all the more!

Thank you very much for the suggestion, Silverback, it makes a lot of sense. Black Sea is always the best of the AI companies in my games and even though I always have a decent share of their stock, I haven't got to the point where I could successfully take them over/merge. But I didn't focus on that, either.

Thank you so much for the suggestion, will definitely put it to use!

thanks again, you guys!

ps. edit: so far I've also used electrics, but it doesn't seem like a good investment to me - even with 40% lower electric track costs, it still costs a fortune to lay track, and the locos are expensive and don't justify the investment :( Although it IS true, I haven't played long enough past the point of getting out of Poland. The thing is, I get frustrated because rights in Germany are so expensive that it takes me several years until I have enough profit and constant revenue to make sense to expand into Germany; that is, I can buy the rights earlier, but I won't have money to actually build any track and buy more trains to expand into Germany, so it doesn't make sense buying the rights when you can't afford to actually use them...

Usually, by 1996 or so I have a PNW of some 4M, and while my company is way better than all the AI ones, I don't get nearly enough in profit to be able to expand, and it seems highly unlikely I'll ever be able to afford track all the way to Venice and Istanbul at the current profit rate.

I guess if I focus on taking out the Black Sea, it might make it easier, because by doing that I'll also get territory rights in Germany, as an aside bonus...plus I'll get more track, plus I'll have fewer competitors - that is, I _do_ hope that the former chairman doesn't start yet another company...

So do people try to get profits from industry in this scenario ?

I've tried it, and did so-so. One needs a lot of spurs because industries are all over the place, and spurs seem to be very expensive and inefficient for this era of expensive locos and super-expensive (if electrical) track. Also, the profits are meager at best, and while I did get some steel factories to "gushing cash" (and bought them), the profit on these is still pretty feeble, and the situation is made worse by inefficient use of locos and laying lots of track to reach the industry resources to complete production chains.

Another thing is that the much-touted (by the official strat guide) Auto industry chain seemed like a major letdown; after several years of supplying the Auto factory in one of the Polish cities, and making sure it was always fully supplied, I have yet to see _any_ autos in there. Sure, I make a profit on running coal/iron/steel (very little with tires), but I never get the autos themselves, which, presumably, would return a bigger profit (finished goods and all that).

I guess, bottom line is that in Poland there's not enough passenger generation - cities being way too close for the speedy trains of the era, and industry profits are too feeble. The result is that the profit rate, and the growth rate of my company, is soooo slooooow, that I'll never get the gold at this rate, and maybe not even Venice.

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I remember this map being really hard. I've only got second place I think before at best. Usually I barely make it into Denmark.

Recently I try electric, and I think I normally did good when I invested in industry (coal/iron/steel/goods all inside poland if I'm lucky, otherwise grain/fertilizer/food works good). I remember at one point doing lumber at north east of poland, and even using dump site for waste.

Normally when I try to get to denmark I end up getting a lot of bonds to finance into germany/denmark and building track. That's usually as far as I get. I'm not a fan of modern maps either, as I find them harder.

I have to agree that it's difficult to play as attempting industry can barely be worth the dedicated train/track, and there seems to be very few passengers/mail with everything being so close.

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Heh, yes, that's pretty much exactly what my situation is as well, Andrew: I did get into the coal/iron/steel/autos chain, and a little into feeding some bakeries and such (including buying them once lucrative or better).

And I feel exactly the same way about this map and modern maps, as well.

Thank you very much for your feedback!

You're right, I _could_ take out more bonds...I usually try not to go too crazy on bonds, because of the interest. Well, on the campaign scenarios up to this one I don't think I've ever _needed_ too many bonds, or not for long, anyway, since profits were pretty easy, but on this one, I'd have to hang on to them for a long time.

And yes, exactly, at the current profit rate, I wouldn't make it too far past Denmark - I'm sure I'd get nowhere near Venice...

Thank you again!

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I just tried playing the map. I got off to really good map with lots of profitable businesses. chemicals->grain->wool->goods (bulldozed a cow farm as no cow butcher on map, didn't want cows eating my grain). I had lots of iron to ship to steel plants and did so (without caring about trying to make steel). Had 2 profitable steel plants and 2 iron sources. Then I got into 2 grain->1 bakery to supply food to cities (only had 5 cities and 7 stations!). Profitable. And no bonds!

Then the horror started.

By year 2000 my company doing really well. Then I realized I needed to have high net worth and forgot to buy stock (I normally try to get most of company at beginning, rarely buy competitor stocks). So I then bought lots of stocks, but got call margins and had to artifically inflate stock prices which in turn hurt my business. I got into germany and near the Denmark border, but eventually couldn't keep up with call margins and quit.

I used diesel trains. Much better than electric.

Normally I just get as many stocks as possible as 2020 approaches to get to Denmark. :P

Impossible to get to venice (I might have once with crazy bonds).

EDIT:

One thing I could not figure out is that my chemical plant was always "poor" even though I had two trains taking chemicals from it all the time to supply grain. I'm guessing a glitch.

EDIT: oops, supposed to send chemicals to fertilizer then to grain, my bad.

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Thanks for further replies, Andrew!

Yes, I ended up in pretty much the same situation in my last play, with respect to the margin calls. Although I was much more aggressive in buying up competitors (and my own stock). Probably too aggressive that time, and then the economy started going down, way down, and I didn't have enough control over the AI to force them to buy back their stock, so eventually I also had to sell and sell and sell...and my PNW went way down, and it wasn't going to end well.

I will also use diesels instead of electric next time. I felt that in this scenario it is hard to recoup the costs for elecs, including laying electric track.

Glad to hear that some industry service does make a profit, I'll continue to do that, although in a limited fashion.

I never went crazy with bonds, either, though maybe I'll try it for this scenario. Who knows. It's not like I can do _worse_. :P

Thank you very much once again for all your feedback! Much appreciated.

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I only went crazy for bonds when 2020 nearing and need to get into Germany/Denmark so I don't lose. Going crazy with bonds too soon will kill you. Usually get bonds when economy is doing fine to get the 5%.

I tried playing again, did well with industries and was profitable (mostly ignored passengers/mail). Havn't left poland yet though. And this time I am sole owner of my business and bought as much other stock as possible so I easily have good net worth for scenario ($15 million, only need $5 I think). Just need to connect to Denmark which I will be able to do with bonds. Other than that, not much else I can do.

I tried what someone else said was to merge with black sea in Germany. I couldn't successfully merge (always denied), so I abandoned trying that.

I definitely suggest diesel. Cheaper trains and track. Easier to get to multiple cities faster. Whereas with electric I connect 2 cities and hope I don't go bankrupt. also makes it harder to buy up my company stock when business not doing so good.

EDIT: LOL tried again and this time within a year two companies were in Poland, so I restarted.

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I retried the map several times. Eventually it came up with a map that had perfect resources, and no competition nearby (they were all east of me).

I ended up getting gold! Took on 2 million in bonds to get to venice, then lots of bonds to get to istanbul. I BARELY got gold as in 2019 I only had 18 million in net worth. Once I connected to istanbul (2015 or so), I maxed out dividends and did nothing until 2020 at which point I got a little over 20 million in net worth!

Where is savegame located? I have a save from when I just started this map and can send to you. win7.

EDIT:

Found savegame location

C:\Users\Andrew\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\Program Files (x86)\Railroad Tycoon II - Platinum\games

Seem unable to upload files in this messageboard. Uploaded to another one.

Here it is.

I connected poznan to lodz first. I guess AI will build wherever, so try until AI don't build nearby?

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Wow, thanks a lot! :) And congrats for the gold, that's really impressive!

I got the save file, I'll look at it later tonight :) Thank you so much!

I've tried it again, too. I agree with you, it's a matter of luck with respect to where the AI build - if they're in Poland, it's pretty much game over. I tried what was suggested above - Poznan to Kaunas/Vilnius...but I couldn't do in in one shot, even single-track and wooden bridges - still not enough money, even with a bond...so I had to do it in two steps - first Poznan to Warsaw, then when the first train got to Warsaw, I had enough money (with the gov't subsidy) to complete the run to Kaunas/Vilnius.

Even so, with some 7 houses in Poznan, and with a FP45 (i.e., not super-fast) loco that goes from Poznan to Vilnius and back, there are still not enough passengers for a full train by the time I get back...sheesh :\

Now I'm contemplating making another run from Krakow to Gdansk, it's as far as it gets in Poland...I'd do Lodz to Vilnius, too, but there's not enough pax in Vilnius for _two_ trains to take...somehow, I think I was in better shape in my previous attempts, when I had lots of spurs serving industry... sheesh.

(Btw, I always get frustrated by the AI who can supposedly make great profits by running _two_ trains between two really close cities...how does that work? Do the passengers replenish faster for the AI? Because I don't get enough passengers for cities 5 times as far from each other, and with slower locos to boot...)

Did you bother with the contracts? Frankfurt to Moscow, that kind of stuff?

Can't wait to take a look at the savegame, maybe I'll get more ideas :)

Thank you again, Andrew, and congrats once more for the hard-earned gold! :D

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I ignore the contracts, as I don't see how possible.

I used diesel (at beginning the cheaper one that cost less to fuel, was also better at hills).

When I got gold I ignored passengers. I had 1 train from beginning that used passengers, and only added a second when I got into Germany. Everything else was industry and buying industries. Only took on 2-3 bonds to finance my purchase of stocks of company and was pure cash until getting to venice and istanbul. It took many "load games" to get just right. The odd time I forgot to buy industry so had to reload, and couple times went bankrupt with net worth.

Industries in poland from savegame:

chemicals->fertilizer->grain->cows->cow plant First big industry I got into and was cash cow. :P 5 profitable buildings.

iron/coal->steel->goods-> second great industry. 4 profitable buildings.

Near the end (2010) when I got into germany I got into:

3xDiesel (from poland port)->german city next to denmark->power plant in german city next to poland->1xwaste to north east poland. Had two of these trains going. Then I had unused coal at poznan and sent 3xcoal to the german power plant (next to poznan, same place as diesel/fuel) and 1xwaste to north east poland. Another cash cow.

Then I quickly went to venice (put up 1 station, no trains), then to istanbul, only 1 station there, and didn't spend any $ on trains or anything, and got lucky my 3 main industries were cash cows and barely got me the gold.

Here's an image of poland near the end. The circled part is 1 station covering grain/chem/coal which is efficient.

http://i.imgur.com/cKQD3.jpg

In image I only have 10 trains (actually all I think I ever got). 2 are passenger (1 for denmark/germany/poland, the other was original that went everywhere in poland). 3 for food. 2 for goods. 2 for diesel->power->waste. 1 for coal->power->waste.

Bought every industry.

Also picked 20% train speed at beginning.

After I got into venice, eventually a guy applied to be manager and had 40% reduced track laying cost and made it cheap to get to istanbul (I'd wait/watch for him if possible).

At first I used single track from poznan->wroclaw(but no stattion yet!), curved up to lodz. Did a couple years(?) of passengers at least until enough to build to bydgoszcz. Then I did the food chain and made a killing. Then connect gdansk+krakow+wroclaw for coal/iron/steel/goods.

I guess I ignored the city of warsaw. At beginning of map no houses there anyway.

One thing that might work better is to wait to connect venice/istanbul till a bit later than I did and make sure to have lots of dividends to pay yourself (get close to 20 million). Because if like me and build to istanbul with like 2 years before finish, you have all the track/overhead and interest on bonds costs increase. If get net worth to near 20 million, then at last minute build to venice/istanbul might work better. Make sure to save lots of different saves! I only got gold by like 1 month and was lucky (I forgot about 20 million net worth until after I connected istanbul, and at the time only had 15 million or so. Then maxed out dividends put speed at 10 and hope for the best).

As you can see in my image, I had no competition. But as long as they stay out of poland you should be fine.

Also until I had every city in poland connected and built more efficient paths, I only needed sand tower and oil place at Lodz station.

http://i.imgur.com/gLJgZ.jpg

Red line = original line single track, no station at wroclaw needed until steel->goods needed.

Once got subsidy and some cash saved up built along green line to get chem->fert->grain->cow->food industry running. All trains forced to go through Lodz for sand and oil. Only built where blue lines are when left poland, and then had to put oil+sand in bydgoszcz and maybe poznan (or closest german city). also oil+sand for warsaw maybe when sending waste up north. I ignored warsaw until I got into germany and sent waste up north.

EDIT:

I think I'm running this campaign in medium difficulty. So not sure if it screws up with your current campaign. Make a save before you do this mission, so you can go back and skip it and keep your gold/silver/bronze from previous missions intact (or maybe it will I dunno).

Hope this helps!! :P

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wow, thank you again!

Of course this helps, it's an amazing explanation - thank you very, very much!

I do appreciate the effort - taking the snapshot, drawing on it, uploading it, etc - not to mention all the actual explanations.

The first thing that struck me when I saw the snapshot was "wow, that looks a lot like my rail network!"

Heh, I guess there aren't too many ways to do it since one is stuck in Poland for quite a while...

Thank you for pointing out the bit about oil and sand, I realized it myself too late in the current game - I should have planned ahead and put a couple of depots with a roundhouse and sand tower on some of the central trunks (as opposed to putting them in city stations)...what you said makes sense - like in your case forcing them to go through Lodz, for example.

It's really interesting that you made the money on the industries, I'm impressed that they proved so profitable! Although I guess the whole point was to get such a map where you have reasonably located components so you can complete a full industry chain.

Very interesting that you made it to gold with only 2 pax trains. I wouldn't have expected it (I've mostly played 1800''s maps, where pax are plentiful, and freight trains are the minority. But it's encouraging, that one can make so much money from the industry.

And you make a very good point, that one should buy right away all those industries. (I'm surprised none of the AIs snatched any of them! I think one of them is into buying industries, personality-wise).

I also noticed I had a very small number of trains - got about up to 6 in my games, but I quit before 2010, so about 10 trains sounds about right.

Thank you for the detailing of the industry chains in the snapshot, it's a really nice setup - and lol at "dead cows"

I don't remember what difficulty my current campaign is - is there a way to find out, after you started it? It's ok, doesn't matter.

I also picked the 20% speed bonus every time, seems the best by far.

And yes, I have used the 40% off electric track guy in some of the games, though not in my current one yet. Thank you for reminding me.

Once again, awesome explanation and lots of help, thank you so much! I gotta be able to do it now :D

I'll keep you posted, though I may not have time to play until Sunday at the earliest. I'll be back...with the gold :P

Did I say thank you?

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I used diesel trains and regular track.

The 40% off track building manager didn't appear (that I noticed) until 2010 or so (just as I was starting to build from venice->istanbul, wished I had waited building to venice and got this guy first).

I was able to make sure I bought all industries by lots of load/save when I forgot to do so.

Most difficult part was 100% company ownership and meeting call margins. Had to take out two bonds to buy back stock to prop up stock prices. Also got rid of the 10% lower stock prices manager once I had 100% of company to help with my net worth.

Very first thing I do when scenario starts was buy shares of my company (may have already done that in savegame?)

Yah, not many PAX, I find my trains end up sitting at stations waiting for cargo too often (Pass/pass/mail/dining/caboose set at half capacity before leaving station). I had minimal stations and track and even trains, which kept costs low. Probably could have got rid of my only passenger train(convert to cargo) once I got cow industry going.

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Well, I finally made it. Got gold in 2017, but it was pretty frustrating all in all.

First, how on earth can the AI make profits by running multiple trains between two towns that are really close? There aren't _nearly_ enough passengers and mail generated to make a profit...yes, I know they don't pay for oil/sand/etc, that's fine. My trains were between cities at 3-4 times the distance, and _still_ spent a lot of time "waiting for cargo". And of course I was serving the industry, too, which the AI doesn't seem to bother much with.

Guess I just had to take that off my chest :)

Anyway, as far as it goes, this was pretty frustrating because there simply was not enough potential for development - in most other scenarios, you can expand a lot and do whatever you want, and make a profit at it. Not here.

I had 2.5-3.5M profits most years, after I set up the network in Poland/Germany (which took a good 10 years).

And my profits dipped after I built the lines all the way to Venice and Istanbul - because of all that track maintenance.

I know it might have been better to try to bring my PNW up first, with a more profitable railroad, and only connect to those at the end, but I got the 40% cheaper track building guy, so I did it when I got him. After I was done with track building, I fired him and got a manager with 25% cheaper fuel costs, which made a pretty big impact. Still, profits were disappointing, for the costs of the locos (and their maintenance).

I only managed to get 80% of my company's shares; AI players and "other investors" held the rest (and it wouldn't let me buy the last batch of shares from "other investors"); this was because of an insane number of splits...

A prosperity and a subsequent boom helped get me to 20M, although I still had time to get there anyway, even without them - it would have taken another year or two, since I was paying myself dividends.

I would have really liked to be able to develop the industry more, but it seems industries are rather scarce on this map, and it's hard to make a profit - at least with diesels. Maybe electrics are better, though I'm not sure, since their fuel and maintenance aren't cheap either, and they are waaaay more expensive up-front than the diesels. Besides, like I said, _speed_ wasn't an issue. My trains spent a LOT of time waiting for cargo - both pax and freight. Faster trains would have meant they just spent more time idle in stations...

Anyway, it was still fun, in the end. Thank you very much Andrew, and everyone else, your advice helped immensely.

Appreciate all your feedback and suggestions and experience :) I still have a lot to learn, and it's a fun process.

Thanks, you guys!

Now, onwards with the remaining ones...

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