Ticket to Ride: Rails & Sails takes the familiar gameplay of Ticket to Ride and expands it across the globe — which means that you’ll be moving across water, of course, and that’s where the sails come in.
61.90€
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adebisi
Here we have an example of a poor implementation of an excellent game. Splitting the deck into two only makes the game drag on longer with a higher probability of having the game stall completely. There is not enough incentive to build early and thus you will see people hoarding and potentially exhausting the decks. Moreover, there are more tokens to spend before you can end the game.
Bombadillo
Remember Ticket to Ride? Well, though exploiting the same basic set of rules, Rails and Sails is no longer the gateway game the former used to be: it’s more of a gamers’ game now; that is, a bigger, longer game that might scare casual gamers as it involves a (slightly) deeper level of commitment and - most of all - a wider strategy. Anyhow, Rails and Sails is a fine game of its own: the rewards for claiming routes and completing tickets are quite balanced with each other at last, which is decidedly an improvement over certain previous versions. Nonetheless, even this iteration still has its drawbacks or it wouldn’t be Ticket to Ride: namely, the harbors and the shower of points they grant to their owners. Simply put, the harbors are game-changers: they grant as many as twenty(four) points or even more to their owner - which is the variance between running for victory and a placing in the rear - but are pretty difficult to build, since there are just so many anchored cards in the ship deck and, especially in the mid to late game, they run short quickly. Knowing this might perhaps help players rethink their strategies for their next plays but this also shows why Rails and Sails can’t be regarded as a gateway game anymore. [i](November 2016)[/i] [b]Update[/b] - I would rate Rails and Sails as my favorite game in the Ticket to Ride series: sure, the base game is great when you need or wish for a simpler, quicker game but under any other circumstances Rails and Sails makes for the better choice, as there are just so many things you can do and you feel under the constant danger of either being cut off a key city you need or not having enough coaches/boats/turns left to do all you still need to. Hence, in November 2017 I raised my rating from 8 to 9, the same as the base game.
bop517
I enjoyed this. I think it adds a bit of decision to the game with the harbors, boats, etc. What I did not care for, and this is the same for other TtR games, is if you do not balance out the tickets at least in the beginning, your game is hosed from the get go. In my game, I did not get a starting ticket worth more than 10 where others had much bigger and better tickets. Meh. Regardless, I love the Great Lakes map and would enjoy playing this again.