The station master position just opened up at your train station. While the former station master kept the station running like clockwork and established simple procedures in the station, it’s now up to you and several others to keep the station going. You have the task of assigning cars to the locomotives and directing passengers to board the appropriate train. The next station master is the one who runs the station the best way possible.
Game Play
A group of your passengers are waiting for your signal to board their train. With only a few seats left on some trains, you have to begin prepping for the next locomotives to arrive. So you wave your hand to signal your passengers to board their train. The last cars are hooked up to their locomotive and trains leave with your passengers happily on their way. New locomotives arrive just in time, while others are still waiting for hookups and passengers. As time passes you notice rivals direct their passengers to board different trains and only 1 car get hooked up to an existing train. Two trains leave the station and 2 new ones arrive. However a group of your passengers missed their train and don’t want to wait, so do you double book a small train about to leave or direct them to one of the new locomotives? Finally you think “Boarding another train is better.”, and direct them to their train. Some time passes and you find the Caboose waiting for your signal to get hooked up. Now you have a choice to make, do you hook up the caboose to send your passengers and others along their way, or add a freight car to a train where your competitor’s passengers are might be better. Then you look at your schedule and realize you still have passengers to board. So you hook-up the Caboose and send the train on its way. Turns out that was a good choice for you since the next train is coming in and you have passengers ready while your competitors are still waiting on more to arrive. More time passes as you watch a couple of freight cars get added to trains of yours additional passenger cars get added to full trains without your passengers. It’s clear your rivals know that you are more efficient and are out to get you now the trick is staying positive. Do you keep trains boarded, hook up freight cars on your rival’s train, or decide to get the trains going as fast as possible. It isn’t long before the last train leaves the station and the station master declared.
The Basics
Players can choose 1 of 2 actions to perform on their turn, play 1 of 3 cards from their hand or place their 1 of 6 passenger chips on a train. When a card is played a new card is pulled from the draw pile. Passenger chips are played face down, to hide it’s value, on a locomotive with an available slot. If a player has placed all their passenger chips then they cannot place more until a train with their chips is scored.
Depending on the number of players determines how many locomotives will be available to play on. Each locomotive can only pull so many cars and hold so many passengers. That is determined by the number shown on each locomotive. A locomotive with a 5, can have 5 cars attached and 5 passenger chips of any color. Once the max number of cars is reached the train then leaves the station and is scored. After the score is recorded a new locomotive is turned face up and the passenger chips are returned to the players.
There are 3 types of cards in Station Master. A green passenger card, red freight car, and yellow event card. Passenger and freight cards have numerical values on them that determine the trains total worth when scored. Passenger cards are positive and freight cards are negative. Event cards allow the player to take a special action which is described on the card. There are events that even effect game play or entire trains.
Each player gets 6 passenger chips to play on a locomotive. The chips are printed with a value of 1 to 3 which determines the number of points a player gets when scoring a train. Passenger chips should be kept face down and hidden from other players. When placing a passenger chip on a locomotive players are allowed to have multiple tokens on one train provided there is space available on the train.
Scoring occurs when a train has the max number of cars or is forced to leave the station with an event card. Players can only score points from trains if they have passengers on the train being scored. When scoring a train the total value of the train cars is calculated and then multiplied by the total value of passenger chips each player has on the train. For example if a player has 2 chips on the train, a 1 and a 2, the total value is 3. If the train’s value is 10 the player would get 30 points because 10 x 3 = 30.
The game ends when all the locomotives have left the station, and the player with the highest score is the station master.
Review
Station Master is a competitive card game that can fill a niche in your game library. The quick play time, competitive nature, and sometimes last minute decisions keep the game exciting from start to finish.
The quick play of this game is because it is easy to pick up and nothing for players to get overwhelmed by. There are only 2 actions a player can take, place passengers (chips) on a train or play a card, which drives focus to the play area and keeps the pace moving quickly. Occasionally players will pause to read one of the few event cards in the game to understand what they do, but the reading is minimal and actions on the cards are easy to understand. Even with new players it doesn’t take more than 2 rounds for the pace to pick up.
By design, Station Master is a very competitive game because players can only score points with their passengers on trains. Each train has limited space so some trains players may not be able to board and those players will devalue the train or limit the points earned for those players on the train. It is also common where a shared train may be devalued just to keep other players from benefiting too much. Also the more chips you have on a train can make it a bigger target for opponents to gang up on you.
For a card game it isn’t very complex, which makes it very easy to pick up. There are only 3 cards to a player’s hand and 6 passenger chips a player needs to worry about when playing. Play works like most card games, play a card then draw a card which most people are familiar with.
Station Master is a card game that is hard to beat if you like an easy to explain game that is quick to play and competitive. This game makes a great game to travel because it doesn’t need much space nor have many components other than the cards. With the quick play time it has potential to be played a lot. It is one game that plays well with any of the suggested number of players.
There are a couple cons to the game though. One being that the lack of balance between special locomotives and playing cards for those locomotives. With only 3 special locomotives, 2 executive class and 1 freight locomotive. The 2 executive class locomotives only have 5 special playing cards that are unique to them. With such scarcity it’s quite possible that during the game you may not have them come up at the same time. The 1 freight train makes negative cards positive and positive cards negative, but only encountering it once during a game doesn’t make it that significant. It does change things up for a short time, but a single train doesn’t stay in the station for very long so players quickly forget about the one off card. A second freight train would make things a little more interesting while not changing the experience of the game much. Another downside is that the yellow action cards can be difficult to read for some people due to the small text.
Intimidation Factor
Station Master has a low intimidation factor because it is a card game. The low intimidation factor is due to very few game components, simple game mechanics, and easy to learn rules.
When setup Station Master doesn’t look like much because there is only cards and plastic chips. Unlike some games that have so many components it simply looks complicated. At a glance players see 2 draw decks, some locomotive cards to play on, each player’s 6 passenger chips and hand of 3 cards.
Once players sit down and begin playing they don’t shy away because the basic play operates like most card games, play a card then draw a card. The same goes for the passenger chips, pick a chip to play and place it on a train. Players quickly grasp how scoring works once a train leaves the station and the train and passenger value is calculated.
Most if not all players will have a solid understanding of the rules to the game by the time the first train is scored. However, by that time they may not have a firm grasp of strategy for optimum placement of cards or passenger chips but as the game goes on it will make more sense thus more fun. By the end of the game more often than not no one will run away with the lead, making it fun for everyone.
Components
There are 2 components to Station Master the cards and plastic poker chips. The cards are the size of your standard playing card. They are also made with the standard card stock for playing cards. Art on the cards is average, it isn’t bad nor is it the best there is. Each card’s value is in a nice large font which is easy to read. However, the yellow action cards could be a little better. The portion of art to text is not as balanced as it could be. Most of the action cards use a small font and vary the positioning of the text. Providing more space for the text and making it a little larger font would make it easier to read for a wider player base.
Mechanics
Station Master uses two simple mechanics to drive the game, they are betting / commodity speculation and hand management.
Station Master’s main mechanic is betting or commodity speculation because it drives the game’s scoring. Betting / commodity speculation occurs when you place your passenger chips on the locomotives. Even though the value of your passenger is not public you are placing a bet on that train whether it will gain you points or not. Chip placement can also determine the overall value of the train since a train with only 1 player’s chips will often be heavily negated while a train with everyone’s chips will be played equally.
Hand management is the secondary mechanic and provides the player choice in how they play. By choosing when and what to play each player can optimize their trains while keeping their opponents from gaining the lead.