Martin Wallace's Brass: exhibition game

[Bacchus]

CH proceeded as per plan (I was slightly afraid he would also spend the turn taking loans), and I did a double-develop, developing away 3 mills and one iron works. I have a Bolton card and a straight up ironworks card which give me some options -- for example canal to Rochdale and Iron Works, using up exactly the two actions I had "spare".

[Bacchus]

Frankly, ports are looking pretty uber, CH can safely build two in Liverpool and Ellesmere Port with his cards, and there will be a giant rush to get access to them. No-one else has ports developed and development is pricey... OH might get in there — which is why I didn't do so myself.

Here is my absolute-worst case scenario (not in chronological order):

Lancaster — canal
Ironworks — canal
Port — port in Ellesmere port
Warrington & Runcorn — sell cotton
Wigan — loan
Bolton — loan

If CH does build a port in Ellesmere Port, this improves to:

Port — develop 1 coal mine, 1 cotton mill

In any case, at the start of the rail period I will have complete freedom to build anywhere and a bunch of cash, which is nice. The dowside is complete lack of high-level buildings

[Old Harry]

Canal round 5/8

I've turned on the "highlight unflipped tiles" option, so that huge grey arrows can obscure any useful information:



Right now I want to flip another tile as -£4 income a turn is problematic. If I don't want to build L1 industries I can only build a coal mine or cotton mill. There isn't much coal demand right now, so sorry CH, I have to help you flip your port.

Preston builds a L2 cotton mill and my cotton mill card sells to your port, flipping both.

The remaining cards will probably get used for:

- Manchester - coal mine (allowing someone else to build an iron works and make developing a bit cheaper)
- Liverpool - Develop ports or cotton mills
- Rochdale - Canal, Warringon - Manchester
- Port - port in Warrington?
- Bolton - Cotton Mill or another loan
- Burnley - Cotton Mill or canal to Bolton

[wetbandit]

So the rulebook online says this: You can build a link from an External location that you are connected to.

The game tells me this when I try to build Rochdale-Yorkshire: You cannot build that canal link, as you have neither connected to nor built in either location.

Huh? Do I not have the correct version of the rules?

[Cheater Hater]

So the rulebook online says this: You can build a link from an External location that you are connected to.

The game tells me this when I try to build Rochdale-Yorkshire: You cannot build that canal link, as you have neither connected to nor built in either location.

Huh? Do I not have the correct version of the rules?

Your network needs to be connected to it, not a network--Bacchus's network counts for transporting goods, but not for building your own links/industries.

[Old Harry]

Yeah, if the colne-Yorkshire canal was yours you could build it. (it took me a couple of games to fully understand the difference between building and delivery networks...)

[wetbandit]

Your network needs to be connected to it, not a network--Bacchus's network counts for transporting goods, but not for building your own links/industries.

Which is deliberately set forth on the first page of said rules.

Throwing down another L1 industry seems poor and with another canal to boot. I do need to get my cotton mill flipped and my income in the black. So I will go with a canal wigan-W&R (colne card) and a port in W&R (W&R card).

Manchester, Rochdale, Stockport, Iron Works, Port, Shipyard.

Future moves involve an iron works in manchester or bolton, whichever maybe available at the time.

[Cheater Hater]

Oh boy--now that the deck's exhausted I need to plan out my next four turns in at least a basic sense. Complicating things further is that I can easily take a double-turn, either by going L2 Port+Loan or L1 Coal Mine+Canal (among other related moves, such as double-Canal). I'm not even sure what I should do as I start writing this post, so let's go over some of them:
1. Port in Liverpool, Loan: This probably is the highest-quality turn I can make a double-turn with, but it doesn't really lead to much, or give me a reason to take the double-turn. Is it a good idea to build Ports without a plan to flip them?
2. Canal: Preston-Wigan, L1 Coal Mine in Wigan: This is interesting, since it means I'm building a L1 industry (), but I'm immediately flipping it for an income boost. Other than that, I'm not really doing much though, and my best move for the second half of the turn is probably just the Liverpool port+something (aka not worth the double-move)
3. L1 Coal Mine in Bury, Canal: Bury-Manchester: This is the default, as it means I have good options for building in Manchester on the second turn. The simple plan is building a L2 Cotton Mill, but then the problem becomes finding an opening to flip it before the end of the Canal Period with only five actions left. The more complicated (and potentially more mean-spirited) is to use a double-action build to plop down my L4 Ironworks in Manchester. While this is obviously a high-scoring play (and gives me an immediate infusion of 15 pounds), it has a lot of problems beyond the obvious loss of an action. Other than the loss of flexibility due to using my last Ironworks, replenishing the iron demand track means everyone else gets to Develop cheaply, and I almost certainly wouldn't benefit (even if I didn't drop all the way to last in the turn order).

Of course, there's no reason I have to use my double-move this turn. I can take an almost double-move by spending between 9 and 12 pounds, and the simplest way to do so is to go L2 Port+Canal. I can also kick the can down the road a bit by going an expensive Develop (L2 Port+L1 Coal Mine), then building a L3 Port in Liverpool.

Right now the plan I'm looking at is one that starts with a Liverpool L2 Port, goes to Ellesmere Port and puts an L3 Port there, goes to W&R and puts my Cotton Mill there, and gets a couple loans somewhere in there. The only question right now is if I can afford to go Port+Canal my first turn, so I can delay the first loan until Turn 7 of the period (to buy the Cotton Mill--unfortunately I'm probably not going to be able to sell my cotton on T7 regardless of what I do, since I can't afford the Cotton Mill without a loan in there somewhere). If I delay my loan, the only person between my turns is wetbandit, but he can mess up my plans by building the W&R/Ellesmere Port canal. However, I want that canal+Cotton Mill+sell to be in a close block together if possible. As such, I want my turns to be Liverpool Port+Loan, Canal+Ellesmere Port Port; then Canal+Loan, Cotton Mill+sell. This also lets me swap plans if something changes (notably if someone sells to the Liverpool Port). The one downside is that I'm not taking nearly as many loans as I probably should be as I go into the Rail Period, but I'm making up for it by actually having income (something almost no one else has at the moment ).

Edit: Sorry for taking so long, this was a complicated turn as I had to plan out the rest of my turns for the Canal Period.

[Bacchus]

Christ, my options suddenly expanded considerably. For example, I can spend the turn building two canals, which will let me go before both CH and wetbandit, which means that I could build a lvl2 mill in Warrington and Runcorn (I have a card) and flip both my mills next turn. Now, OH can also build a cotton mill in Manchester or Burnley and flip it straightaway, but that's fine by me, there are enough ports. The biggest problem with this is that I won't be able to take a loan before flipping, which is not so efficient. I will also take one less loan than I expected this turn, but that's not so bad, 4 loans is probably overkill.

I'm also obviously tempted to take the planned develop action now, rather than later. But then there might not be any ports available. This really is Brass at its best.

Incidentally, even if we weren't playing open hand, I would have known that OH can't steal the Warrington and Runcorn cotton mill spot as there are only two W&R cards in the deck, and wetbandit used the one I don't have.

[Cheater Hater]

The biggest problem with this is that I won't be able to take a loan before flipping, which is not so efficient.

Could you explain what you mean by this? Isn't it best, everything else equal (you don't the money to complete actions or want to manipulate the turn order) to take loans as late as possible so you pay less interest?