Pampas Railroads Rules

RULES COMPONENTS:  1 Map Board  5 Shares of 6 different companies (Sud, Norte, Oeste, Pacifico, Central and Córdoba)  Colored tracks to mark linked routes  Bills in denominations of 1, 5, 25 and 100  6 special action card  Wooden discs or cubes to mark used actions and developed cities

Note that company treasuries are integrated into the board and kept separate from player finances.

SETUP: Each player receives starting $ and a special action card. Starting money depends on the number of players:

 The player who wins auction starts the bidding on the next company share up for auction.

 The player acquiring the initial share constructs one free line beginning in Buenos Aires, limited to the options displayed on the board. Ex) The auction winner of Sud may build a free line from Buenos Aires to Las Flores OR Maipu. Place a colored track marker corresponding to the selected

Ex) Winner of Sud then starts bidding on Norte. $0 is a valid bid.

$50 – 6 players $60 – 5 players $70 – 4 players $80 – 3 players

GAME START: After initial 5 lines are auctioned, the game begins. The player who buys last share begins game as start player.

INITIAL AUCTION: 1 share of each company other than Cordoba is auctioned off in order, beginning with the start player placing Sud up for auction: Sud (Orange) Norte (Green) Pacifico (White) Oeste (Yellow) Central (Sky Blue)

 Each player on his or her turn may take 1 of 3 actions as follows: Action: Construct Track Pay $5 from a particular company’s treasury to establish a new link OR pay $15 to build two consecutive links. The player who chooses this action chooses which company will construct track. The person owning the most shares makes the decision on which track to construct (at a minimum 1 link of track for $5). If there is a tie among number of shares held, the active player makes the decision on where to build track.

 Cordoba (Grey) is NOT auctioned.  The amount paid by the winning bidder at auction goes into that respective company’s treasury held on the board beneath remaining shares. 1

 This action may only be chosen in the company has at least $5 in its treasury unless no company has at least $5, at which point it is legal, but the track construction action is wasted.

Ex) Buenos Aires has an initial value of 5; after the first development, place a disc on the 5 box in Buenos Aires, increasing the value to 6.  Fronting development. When you choose the develop action, no money is paid. But a player choosing this action can may also pay $3 from his own cash to develop a second settlement. .

 Lines with one way arrows are restricted. Ex) You may build from San Nicolas to Rosario, but not from Rosario to San Nicolas.

 Limits to developing metros. At any given time, Buenos Aires must be the most developed city. Also, Cordoba and Rosario must be more developed than Tucuman.

 Regional Builds: This represents building track to a foreign destination: From Rosario de la Frontera to Paraguay and Bolivia; from Mendoza to Chile; and in the case of the deep water port of BahÍa Blanca, to the shipping destinations of Europe and North America.

Action: Offer Stock Pick a specific share of stock from 1 company that is in the corporate treasury, or pick one of your shares. The player taking the offer stock action starts the bidding if she chooses to auction a corporate share. If she auctions her own share, she may not participate in the bidding and the first bidder is the player to her left.

To construct the regional build from the appropriate city costs the first number from the foreign connection (e.g., $40 for Mendoza), but do not add income to the company based on this connection. Instead, add the second number behind the “/” ($30 in the case of Mendoza) to the company’s value.1 Indicate the regional build and foreign connection, place a disc marker on the connection cost.

The initial bid is 1/5 of the company’s value (round up). Remember, value is typically number of tracks multiplied by $5, plus $15 for each regional bonus. If you buy a stock from company, proceeds go to company treasury, giving it an influx of cash to buy more track. On the other hand, if you buy a player, cash goes directly to the player who auctions the share.

 Important: Whenever a player constructs a regional build, a special dividend payment is triggered for that company only; this does not count as one of the nine game-ending dividends. Action: Develop Settlements

Special Action A player who chooses the settlement action chooses a settlement (metro city, town, mine or port) and marks it with a disc which gives it an increase in value. The game board map has a key to the improvement value of each development.

Each player may surrender their special action card on their turn to substitute for any of the other 3 actions: Development, Constructing Track or Offering Stock. This tactic may be used to select an unavailable action or to delay the triggering of a dividend payout.

For metro cities, such as Buenos Aires, each development increases the value as marked with a disc.

CORDOBA – When a player constructs track connecting to Cordoba, the Cordoba company is open for auction, and the person connecting begins the bidding. As with the purchase of the initial

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Value is typically $5 per piece of track in company’s color. See description of computing value below.

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stock from the other companies, Cordoba also gets a free track construction—either to Cruz del Eje or Deán Funes

After a dividend payout, the start player marker passes to the next person. GAME END: The game end is triggered when the 9th dividend payout occurs. (See map board.)

COMPUTING INCOME: Computing income is by link for each railroad. Stated alternatively, cities in the middle of a line count multiple times, perhaps even more than two with branching.

FINAL DIVIDEND PAYOUT: Final payout is in the 9th round and is slightly different. The value of the company is now included. 1) Add a company’s value to its income.

Ex) La Plata to Buenos Aires (with no improvement) is $2 for La Plata and $5 for Buenos Aires. If the same company also had track from Buenos Aires to San Nicolas, there would be an additional $6 ($5 for Buenos Aires, counted again for the separate track to San Nicolas, plus the $1 for San Nicolas). Thus, the entire income of a link from La Plata to San Nicolas via Buenos Aires with no developments would be $13.

2) Divide the total by the number of shares in players hands, collectively. 3) Each player gets that much money depending on the number of shares in hand  The winner is determined by the most money at game’s end. In the event of a tie, the tied player with the most shares of the company with the highest value wins.

COMPUTING VALUE: Value is computed by $5 per link of track in a company’s network. Additionally, foreign connection value from regional builds (the second number after the “/” contributes to company value. DIVIDEND PAYOUT: Whenever available actions are exhausted to the point where only one type is left, dividends are paid out. Dividends are equal to income of the company/5 (rounded up) per share. The denominator is 5 because there are 5 shares for each company.  Dividend payouts are also triggered when a regional build is completed.

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