Trains and Stations Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Object
• Components
• Setup
  • Preparing to Play
• How to Play
  • The Dice
  • Overview
  • Step 1: Gather Dice
  • Step 2: Roll Dice
  • Step 3: Resolve Dice
  • Step 4: Delivery!
  • Step 5: Goods Depletion & Upgrade
  • Upgrade Speculation
• The End of the Game
• Scoring
• Miscellany
  • Power Cards
  • Public Knowledge
  • Negotiation
• Turn Reference

Object

The goal of the game is to collect victory points (VP), which you will do in the following ways:

• Deliver: Help complete routes between cities by placing your train dice on the tracks.
• Develop: Erect Buildings, which give you Goods each time a delivery is made to that city. End the game with the most Goods of a given type, and you score points for monopolizing that type of Good.
• Profit: Certain power cards list long routes between two cities. If those cities get connected, you score!

Components

• 1 game board
• 50 custom six-sided dice
  • 40 player dice (8 each in 5 different colors)
  • 10 Bonus dice (white)
• 45 plastic Buildings
  • 9 Buildings (3 Ranches, 3 Mines, 3 Hotels) each in 5 player colors
• 25 Coin tokens
• 1 Conductor's Hat token
• 120 cards
  • 60 Goods cards (10 each of 6 different types)
  • 20 Power cards
  • 40 Victory Point cards (30 x 1VP; 10 x 5VP)

Each Goods card shows the Buildings that can stock this Goods and its Monopoly endgame VP value.

Setup

Place the game board in the middle of the table. Sort the Goods cards by type and place them on the board face up as follows:

• Place Cattle cards on the Ranch space.
• Place Worker cards on the Hotel space.
• Place Coal cards on the Mine space.
• Place the Food, Silver, and Gold card stacks to the side of the board.

Trains & Stations uses a variable number of VP cards based on the number of players:

• For 5 players, use all the VP cards (80 VP total).
• For 4 players, remove two 5-VP cards (70 VP total).
• For 3 players, remove four 5-VP cards (60 VP total).

Place these VP cards in the corresponding spaces on the game board.

Shuffle the Power Cards and deal 3 to each player face down. Each player chooses 2 of the Power Cards to keep for the game and returns the remaining card to the Power Card stack. Shuffle the remaining Power cards and place them face down in the Power Card space of the game board.

Give all players the 8 dice in their color. Place the white Bonus dice next to the game board. Give each player 3 coins and three 1VP cards from the VP card stack on the board. Put the remaining Coins in the bank (next to the board).

Preparing to Play

Choose a player to be the Conductor (we recommend the player who has taken the most recent train ride) and give that player the Conductor's Hat token. The Conductor takes the first turn and keeps the Conductor's Hat token for the rest of the game. This ensures that at the end of the game all players get the same number of turns.

How to Play

In Trains & Stations, each player takes a turn in order. Each player's turn follows the structure given below. When a player's turn is finished, play passes to the next player.

The Dice

Each of the dice has six custom faces: Coin, Hotel, Mine, Ranch, Locked Train, Train.

Overview

On your turn, roll your player dice (along with any bonus dice). You may reroll some of them (see Step 2: Roll Dice). Once you are satisfied with the results, you erect Buildings and fill routes with trains. Once you have either placed or saved all of your dice, all players score for any completed routes.

Step 1: Gather Dice

Players have 8 dice in their player color. This allows players to commit some dice to the board while still rolling up to 5 dice of their color on their turn.

At the start of your turn, gather up to 5 of your player dice (ones that are not currently placed on the board). If you have more than 5 dice available, set the extras aside. If you have fewer dice available (you have 4 or more of your dice on the board already), then gather as many of your dice as possible.

Saved Dice: If you have saved one or more of your rolled dice from your previous turn (see Saving Dice, below), count these dice first when gathering 5 dice to roll for the turn.

Bonus dice: If you have any available bonus dice (acquired from Step 4: Delivery!), you can roll them with your player dice. This can give you more than 5 dice to roll in a turn. Rolling more than 5 dice is optional (exception: see below); you may save the bonus dice for another turn.

If you have fewer than five of your own dice and have access to bonus dice, you must gather bonus dice as necessary to bring yourself to a minimum of five total dice. Also, if there are no Bonus dice in the Bonus dice pool at the beginning of your turn, you must roll all of your Bonus dice.

Reclaim Dice: If you have 5 or more dice on the board, you may reclaim all dice of your color from the board and skip the rest of the turn. (Bonus dice on the board are not owned by any particular player so may not be reclaimed.)

Step 2: Roll Dice

Next roll all of your gathered dice. If you saved dice from a previous turn, you may either keep them on their current face, or you may roll any or all of them with your other dice.

Rerolls: After you roll, you may spend 1 Coin to reroll any number of dice (except for Locked Trains). You may repeat this as many times as you have Coins to spend, or until you roll three Locked Train results. If you roll three Locked Trains, see Strike! below.

Strike! If you have rolled 3 or more Locked Train dice, then your workers go on strike! You may not reroll any more dice (even if you have Coins to do so) and you lose 3 VP. If you have fewer than 3 VP, you lose all of your VP instead. Continue your turn with Step 3: Resolve Dice.

Example: Eric has a saved Ranch die, which he chooses not to roll. He rolls his other dice and gets Locked Train, Hotel, Hotel, and Coin. He pays a Coin from his pool and rerolls his Coin die and his saved Ranch die, hoping to get another Hotel. Instead, he rolls two more Locked Trains - his workers strike!

Step 3: Resolve Dice

When you have finished rolling and rerolling dice, apply the effects of your rolled dice:

Placing Trains: You must place each of your Train and Locked Train dice in Route spaces next to a Station or next to another space already occupied by a Train or Locked Train die. If this fills all Route spaces between two or more Stations, the Route has been completed and a Delivery occurs; see below.

Erecting Buildings: If you have a set of 3 or more matching Building faces, place one of the corresponding Buildings from your supply (if available) on an open build space at a station of your choice (however, see below) and return those dice to your pool. If you do not have any corresponding buildings available in your supply, you gain nothing.

You may place more than one Building in a turn if you roll multiple sets of 3 (via Bonus dice).

When erecting a Building, you must abide by the limitations of both locations and levels.

Locations: Stations have either 2 or 3 building locations. The number of building locations is indicated by the blue arcs between the gear spokes bordering the Station image. A Station may not have more Buildings than the number of building locations. (Example: San Antonio can have 2 Buildings.)

Levels: Players can not erect a second Building on a Station until all Stations have one Building. Likewise, players may not place a third Building on a Station until all stations have two Buildings.

Gain Coins: Return any or all of your dice showing the Coin icon to your pool. Gain 2 Coins for each die returned (you cannot have more than 5 Coins at a time).

Saving Dice: You may choose to save any number of your player dice that show a Building or Coin face for your next turn. You cannot save bonus dice. Keep saved dice on the face that was rolled and set them aside. These dice will count toward your next hand of 5 dice.

Example: Last turn, Eric only rolled 2 Hotel icons which means he wasn't able to exchange them for a Hotel Building. He decided to save these dice. This turn, he starts with those 2 dice on the Hotel side and rolls 3 of his player dice.

Bonus Dice: Return any Bonus dice that you rolled (but that were not placed on the board) to the common pool at the end of this step. If you chose not to roll some of your bonus dice, you may save those bonus dice for a future turn.

Step 4: Delivery!

If all Route spaces between two or more cities are filled with dice, this triggers a Delivery. Deliveries potentially benefit all players in the game.

All cities connected by a common group of rail squares are considered part of the same delivery. If multiple Deliveries happen on the same turn, the player whose turn it is chooses the order to resolve them.

When a Delivery occurs, score it by following these steps in order:

1. Completion VPs: Each player that has one or more colored player dice in a completed Route gains 1VP per city that is connected by that Route. Players do not receive VPs for cities that are connected by Routes that have none of their player dice. Bonus (white) dice do not count toward any player's majority.

Example: On his turn, Eric places 3 of his Trains (blue dice) in the spaces shown above. These combine with Bryan's Trains (red dice) and the bonus dice already on the board to connect Seattle, Los Angeles, and Billings; as well as Billings and Detroit. Eric decides to resolve the Seattle-Los Angeles-Billing Delivery first.

Since Eric and Bryan each have dice on the Route, each player gains 3 VPs (one for each of the 3 cities).

2. Majority Bonus: The player that has the most Train dice along a completed Route between two cities gains the bonuses listed for each of the connected cities. Bonus (white) dice do not count toward any player's majority. If multiple cities are connected during a turn, the player who receives the Majority bonus for each completed Route is determined for each of the completed Routes. The bonus is either additional VP, a Power card, or a Bonus die. The player whose turn it is breaks all ties (even if that player is one of those tied). If you are awarded Bonus dice or a Power card as a majority bonus and none are available, you receive nothing.

Eric and Bryan are tied for the most dice, so as the active player, Eric breaks the tie in favor of himself. He gains the bonuses from all 3 locations.

3. Collect Goods: Each player that has a Building on a connected Station collects a Goods card provided by that Building (from the stack of Goods cards in that Building's Goods space on the game board) and places that card face down in front of them. Players with multiple Buildings collect a Goods card for each. If the Goods stack has been depleted, the player instead collects 1 VP; the active player decides the payout order.

Eric, Bryan, Sarah, and Ken each own one Mine (which is currently producing Coal) on the connected Stations. There are only 3 Coal cards left in the stack, so Eric gives everyone but Ken a Coal card. Ken instead collects 1 VP.

4. Completing Missions: If any player has a Mission Power card showing two cities that are now connected, that player may reveal and score that Mission card. Place the card face up for its VP value at the end of the game (do not take VP cards from the VP stacks). Players may complete Missions even if they do not have dice on the Route.

If a player has two of the same Mission, that player can only score one of the cards and will have to wait until the Mission is completed during a subsequent turn to score the second card. If a player forgets and the turn has passed to a new player, the player must wait until the next time the Route has a Delivery.

Example: After the other scoring and payouts are completed, Sarah reveals her Seattle-to-Detroit Mission Power card. Even though Sarah doesn't have any Trains on either of those Routes, she still gets to complete the Mission.

5. Reclaim Dice: Players reclaim all player dice from the connected Stations. Return Bonus (white) dice to the pool.

Step 5: Goods Depletion & Upgrade

At the end of a player's turn, if all Goods cards are depleted from one or more Building stacks, perform a Goods upgrade on that building. If more than one Goods stack is depleted, the active player chooses only one of them to upgrade. The other upgrade(s) must wait until the end of the next player's turn.

To upgrade, take the next level of available Goods (as indicated in the chart below the Building space) and stack it in the Building space. If the next level of Good is not available (i.e., that Goods was used in another stack), then place the next upgrade into that stack.

If upgrading the Hotel, the active player chooses whether to upgrade it to Silver or Food. Once the Silver or Food on the Hotel is depleted, the Hotel upgrades to Gold, not to either Silver or Food.

If it is not possible to upgrade a Goods (that is, the Gold stack has been placed already), then that Building space is left empty and Buildings of that type no longer produce any Goods for the remainder of the game.

Example: All Cattle cards have been taken from the Ranch. The chart says that the next stack to be placed should be Food. However, the Food stack has already been placed on the Hotel, so the Gold stack is placed on the Ranch instead.

Upgrade Speculation

Immediately after the new Goods stack has entered play, each player may secretly and simultaneously trade any Goods from their supply at a 2:1 rate to immediately gain the new Goods. Goods thus traded are revealed face up to other players and then removed from the game (put back in the game box).

Example: The start of the game featured an aggressive run on Cattle; Eric has 6 Cattle, Sarah has 3, and Bryan has 1. The stack of Food cards has just been added to the Ranch. All players have the chance to speculate on the upgrade.

With 6 Cattle, Eric figures that the other players will trade away their worthless Cattle cards, since he has such a commanding lead. He trades in 4 Cattle and 2 Workers (a total of 6 Goods cards) to gain 3 Food.

With only 1 Cattle card, Bryan knows it will be worth nothing at the end of the game. He trades it and a Coal card for 1 Food card.

Sarah takes a gamble. She wants Eric to think that she is trading away all her Cattle. Instead, she keeps it all and trades in 2 Workers and 2 Coal for 2 Food.

At the end of speculation, Bryan has 0 Cattle cards, Eric has 2 Cattle, and Sarah has 3. Now it looks like Sarah has the lead, but no one knows who might have Cattle on their power cards...

If this speculation causes the new Goods to be depleted, do not perform another Goods Upgrade until the end of the next player's turn. If there are not enough Goods cards to give each player the quantity they traded in for, the player whose turn it is decides how cards are awarded and may split them as they see fit between eligible players. All players who do not receive the Goods card instead receive 1VP (taken from the VP stack) for each 2 Goods cards they traded in.

The End of the Game

Once the VP cards on the board are depleted, the endgame begins. Each player gets one last turn until the Conductor (first player's) turn would begin. The game ends without the Conductor taking another turn. In this way, each player gets an equal number of turns in the game.

Although the VP card pile has run out, players still gain VPs as normal (use the VP cards that were not used in setup).

Scoring

Each player counts the total value of their VP cards and adds any Victory Point from completed Mission cards.

In addition, the player with the highest quantity of each Goods scores the Monopoly bonus at the bottom of the card:

• Worker + 4 Points
• Coal + 6 Points
• Cattle + 6 Points
• Silver + 7 Points
• Food + 7 Points
• Gold + 9 Points

If two or more players are tied for quantity of a Goods card, all tied players score the full Monopoly bonus.

Coins have no value at the end of the game (they are not worth VPs).

The player with the highest score wins the game! In the case of a tie, the player with the most Gold wins. If still tied, all tied players win.

Miscellany

There are a few other rules that you need to know.

Power Cards

A Power card that shows 2 Goods may be used in two ways:

1. It may be turned in during Upgrade Speculation as if it were 2 Goods cards, or
2. It may be kept until scoring, when it counts as 1 of each Goods shown for determining Monopoly bonuses for those particular Goods.

Public Knowledge

Victory point cards are kept face up once acquired by players. All other cards in a player's possession (Power, Goods) are kept face down. The owning player can inspect them at any time, but other players are not allowed to know either the quantity or content of those cards.

Negotiation

Players can negotiate any deals they want as long as all deals are negotiated at the table with the other players able to hear (no leaving the table, no whispering, no note-passing).

Players can agree to whatever they wish, however players cannot give each other cards or dice of any type.

Warning: There is no requirement that players perform the actions they agreed to!

Turn Reference

Step 1: Gather Dice

• Saved dice from last turn (save or roll)
• Maximum of 5 player dice
• Bonus dice as required to reach 5 dice
• Other Bonus dice as desired
• All bonus dice if pool is empty
• OR reclaim dice from board and end your turn

Step 2: Roll Dice

• Pay one Coin to reroll any dice desired
• Three Locked Trains: lose 3 VP and end rerolls

Step 3: Resolve Dice

• Place Trains and Locked Trains (required)
• Erect Buildings
  • Station must have space
  • Stations must be built up equally
• Gain 2 Coins per Coin die
• Save dice as desired
• Return rolled Bonus dice to pool

Step 4: Delivery!

• Completion VP: All players with dice in the Route get 1VP per city
• Majority Bonus: The single player with the most Trains gets city bonuses (Gain 1 Bonus die, Score extra VP, or Draw 1 Power card)
• Collect Goods: Each building in connected Stations provides 1 Goods card or 1 VP
• Complete Missions: Each player reveals one Mission Power card if the two cities are connected
• Reclaim Dice

Step 5: Goods Depletion & Upgrade

• One depleted Building upgrades its Goods once
• Players can trade 2 Goods for 1 upgraded Goods