Age of Steam

Setup: Rust Belt supports 3–6 players. Begin with capacity 1, income 0, two issued shares and $10 each; randomize initial order. Fill 52 goods-display spaces, put three goods each in Pittsburgh and Wheeling and two in every other starting city. White goods are unused.

Round: Issue shares, determine player order, select actions, build track, move goods, collect income, pay expenses, reduce income, grow goods and advance the turn marker. The player-count marking on the turn track determines the last round.

Finance and auction: Each new share gives $5, within the share-track limit. Raise the bid or drop out. The first dropout goes last and pays nothing; the final two bidders pay their full bids. Other dropouts pay half their own bids, rounded up.

Special actions: In the new order, each player chooses a different action: First Move, First Build, Engineer, Locomotive, Urbanization, Production or Turn Order. Engineer permits four tiles; Locomotive immediately increases capacity. Turn Order permits one pass without dropping out in next round's auction, but not when only two bidders remain.

Build: Normally place or replace up to three tiles, paying track and terrain costs. A player's first tile must be simple track connected to a city; later construction must ultimately reach a city through that player's track. Do not build off-map, on a city or directly into another player's track. Cities and towns allow connections. Urbanization freely replaces a town with a new city before building and does not consume the normal three-tile allowance.

Ownership: A completed link joins two cities or towns and remains owned permanently. An unfinished section becomes unowned if its owner has not extended it with another tile by the end of their next build phase. Redirection alone is not extension. Replacements must preserve opponents' existing track.

Delivery: Play two rounds, moving at most one good per player in each. Use completed links to reach a matching city, stopping at the first matching city, never revisiting a city or town and never exceeding your capacity in links. Each traversed link increases its owner's income by one; return the good to the bag. Once per round, replace one delivery opportunity with a capacity increase; maximum capacity is six.

Operations: Collect the cash shown by income, then pay $1 per issued share plus $1 per capacity level. Spend all available cash first; each unpaid dollar reduces income by one. Falling below zero income eliminates the company. Then reduce income by 2 at 11–20, 4 at 21–30, 6 at 31–40, 8 at 41–49 and 10 at 50 or above.

Growth and scoring: Resolve the light goods display before the dark display; roll dice equal to the starting player count. Matching results send remaining topmost goods in the relevant columns to their cities. Production can refill two empty boxes before rolling. At game end score three points per income, one per track section in completed links and minus three per issued share. Cash scores nothing; ties stand.