Settlers of America – Trails to Rails - Tips & Strategies

While the game feels like a typical Settlers game, a point of emphasis is that, unlike Settlers, there is NO scoring in Trails to Rails. You win if you deliver all your goods first. Period. And you can only deliver goods as fast as you develop new settlements (which free up more of your goods to be delivered). Don’t get stuck in the end game with goods trapped off the board because you have not built enough settlements. Being very aggressive in the western expansion of your territories will go far to alleviate any such problems (and benefits you in other ways as well). Don’t let your opponents make it too expensive for you to expand west by grabbing all the settlements within “two wheats” (what you pay to move your settler wagon) of your nearest town.

First off, I agree with Fez’s tip. Westward expansion is definitely where it is at. But, at the game advances and everyone is moving west, there are there are some typically some neglected cities on the east and southern coasts. I often use these as a quick settlement of two in the endgame to free up those last couple of goods and to pick up a few easy gold pieces. Most players will not have the infrastructure in place to capitalize on your new settlements. Don’t do this too soon though since of course those cities will produce fewer goods as a result of the number tokens moving.