Smr Simple!

How do you decide whether it's best to liquidate an opponent or to merge?

I usually liquidate but I'm not sure really if this is the best tactic. Some of the AI players do some weird things but they obviously make money so when would you merge instead?

I allways merge. The idea of taking over a company is to expand the reach of your railroad and/or reach game goals.

Agreed, seems very counterproductive to me to buy everything a company has, and then just throw it in the thrashbin.

It's always possible to optimize your holdings after you buy a competitor (so you don't suddenly have two trains hauling the same cargo on the same track).

I think I'm just a megalomaniac at heart and just like to see just the tracks I laid on the map and no one else's

Depends for me, if the new company really stretches into areas I am not In I will merge and clean it up but if I bought them out to corner my market I usually merge them unless I want a new station in a city I already have one.

I always liquadate.

I can usually take the money I get from liquadation and re-build more profitable (and better-looking) routes that were just deleted.

I especially hate it when the AI plays leapfrog with my routes and just runs parallel lines to all my lines... this is when there is NO OPTION but to liquadate (to me, at least...)!

too often the computer players have layouts that to me appear somewhat insane- and often block line expansion from some stops. Plus, the computer players have the ability to micromanage the train consists, which rather leaves a lot of re-routing to do. I tend to liquidate unless it'll help me quickly achieve an objective such as connecting cities.

Merge... One thing the AIs can do that we cannot is make those dratted consist changes per available good at the dopot. And believe it or not, that keeps right on happening after you own it. Also, If you have a dopot 4 track loaded, you may have up to 4 more tracks to use. Look over each train, they are the last on the engine list, and see what they are doing. If it looks bad, change or delete it. Also, you get all the industries he owns, that's money

Merge - Provided they were making money when you took them over.

The value of the liquidation doesn't seem like anywhere near enough to me, so its very rare I'd liquidate. (Especially if you just spent $13mil, plus your existing shares. to take them over)

Last night I merged a competitor I took over for the first time.

It was cool to see their trains to continue to change their consist around, but the funny thing was that there were only three or four trains running. The vast majority of their messy rail network was empty. I ended up having to manually delete almost all of their track and build my own lines and trains.

I guess it was beneficial to be able to build lines in another area of the map, but I would have just rather pressed that “liquidateâ€

Merge can often give you the bonus of a second terminal in a key, busy city. If that is the case, I merge and then instantly retire all trains and delete all connecting track and unwanted stations / annexes.

Just leave the stations that you want to use either now or for future expansion.

I prefer to merge. If I liquidate, the competition will get all those goods for some time. Even if the company is a mess, it steals goods from others and prevents their expansion.

Merge or liquidate? I've tried both but I prefer liquidation because the AI really seems to build lousy railroads.

The AI seems to be particularly weak in this game. Nowhere near the challenge of the earlier Railroad Tycoon games.

That being said I do find the graphics are rather well done but I am getting tired of the music everytime I do a locomotive upgrade. "Pardon me boy...." ad infinatum ad nauseum."

Yucaipa

Yucaipa wrote:The AI seems to be particularly weak in this game. Nowhere near the challenge of the earlier Railroad Tycoon games.

Just an off subject side note, if you go into the map you want into 'RRT_Scenario' and find the AIs playing, you can go into 'RRT_Characters' and change their abilities. Heck, change them all.

Could you please rephrase this so that a casual play like me can understand it? I just don't understand your point. Are you saying one can upgrade the AI? And if YES, then how exactly?
Thanks