There are tons of great modded maps out there, but part of me likes to just keep playing the "stock" in-box maps.
I've done (or am going to do) some basic things to make these more challenging/realistic. I already play on Robber Baron/Hard Routing.
Here is what I have/will do:
- Decreased maintenance costs on all diesel/electric engines by 1/4 to "make sense" to move to them from steam. Reduced speed of most of them, especially the GP series (120MPH GP is nuts).
- Reduced passenger/mail production rate in all towns/cities/metros by 1/2.
- Reduced passenger/mail "storage" cap by 1/2.
- Plan to increase bridge/tunnel building cost by 10x (or more!).
Does anyone have a link to a strategy guide that describes how the sim computes passenger/mail values? Playing on the above settings made my average passenger delivery only about $8K and mail about $4K, which is almost too low.