Which are the hardest scenarios?

[Autist]

Hello, I've been playing RRT2 for a long time, on and off, the standard game, and am quite experienced. Some time ago I got Platinum, in search of more demanding scenarios.
So far completed first few missions in TSC campaign, and a few scenarios that seemed to be challenging. Playing on hard/expert, but none of them are particularly difficult and I can get an easy gold.
Is TSC campaign harder than original? Don't like modern trains, prefer steam engines and 19th or early 20th century, so reluctant to go with that campaign.
Can you recommend some really difficult, hardest scenarios to complete?

[PaganFears]

The TSC campaign is quite a bit harder than the original but if you are an experienced player you probably won't have a problem with getting Gold on those either. The last three scenarios of the TSC campaign are in a post-apocalyptic setting with only steam engines available. You might like them.

The disc copy of the Gold version used to come with dozens of user made scenarios. As far as I know they are not included in the Steam release but most (all?) of them can be downloaded from here: https://forum.dune2k.com/files/category/63-railroad-tycoon-2/ (maps are inside the subcategories on the right)
Not everything uploaded here was part of the Gold release, there are many more here. Unfortunately the quality of the uploaded maps vary greatly so it takes time to find the really good ones.

If you want a really hard scenario my first suggestion would be Cascadia: https://forum.dune2k.com/files/file/801-cascadia/
Heavily scripted, considered one of the best and most complex user made scenarios. Post-apocalyptic setting, you only have steam engines at the start.

A few others I played and liked:
https://forum.dune2k.com/files/file/865-that-toddlin-town/ - Not that hard but a nicely scirpted scenario, mostly steam age with a bit of early electrics.
https://forum.dune2k.com/files/file/814-wellsville-addison-and-galeton/ - This is a difficult one, might be to your liking though it's mostly set in the diesel age.
https://forum.dune2k.com/files/file/739-lion-of-africa/ - Quite easy if you start as an English company in the North but hard if you pick another nation to start with - I played this as a German company starting in Tanzania. Steam age map.
https://forum.dune2k.com/files/file/896-flying-scotsman/ - Moderately hard steam age map; the difficulty comes from being limited in how many railroad tiles you are allowed to build.
https://forum.dune2k.com/files/file/922-vorwohle-emmerthaler-eisenbahn/ - I recommend this if you want to try something very different. Here you have to make deliveries with a single diesel engine on a German branch line.

[Autist]

Awesome, thanks for the detailed response, really appreciate it. I'll give those a try. German side Africa seems very interesting. And later I can try Cascadia and others. All suggestions are nice and worth playing.
Wasn't aware of post-apocalyptic steam engines - sounds fantastic! Gives value to TSC campaign- so I should probably play it also.
Plenty of fun and challenges are secured, thanks!

[BigSilverHotdog]

Regarding the RS Bennett maps there are 2 that are extremely, extremely good: Oregon and Cascadia.

They're very difficult, easy to adjust in the editor for custom engines, conditions, or even higher difficulty, and are just fantastic maps of extremely high quality. Renewed Zealand and Toddlin' Town are much more restricted and linear, but are still good, solid challenges.

My 20+ year love affair with this game has given me quite a bit of experience modifying maps to make them harder or to add a new twist on an old favourite and I've got so many different modded versions of (what I consider to be) the best maps. It is simply ridiculous.

But RS Bennett's maps contain some of the most clever scripting ideas and complicated rule sets ever seen in RRT2 mapmaking, and when a grizzled old veteran like me says that you can be assured it really means something.

I wish there were more mapmakers out there like RS Bennett.

edit: Here's a few more maps that I consider good and hard (though I had to make modifications to further improve/difficultize[SP.] all of these, some of them with 10+ hours of work put in):

Unite the States
Pacific Northwest
Great Crater
The Iron Spike
Making the Grade
America After the Flood
The Parniath Bridge

[graf_0]

PaganFears - can you suggest other scripted scenarios. I just played Huge USA history scenario and that was Great, Almost a different game.

[Autist]

I played Lion of Africa (German side) - it was a very good challenge. Demanded quite a bit of thinking and planning. Very narrow margin to meet the requirements, hard to make extra cash, any overstretching is punished. I did have a great surplus of industry profits, and good book value, almost for gold (but no gold since I don't care much about PNW, and trying to play realistically, without tricks).
Strategy is demanding, took me a while to get it right. But once I managed to set up a profitable industry on Serengeti plains, it was a success, and towns grew quickly, charming.
Great map, good replay value because of several nations to choose from, demanding terrain, and industry is spread very differently with each new start.

PaganFears thanks once again!

Now I can try other suggestions. And thanks Rainbow Droid - will try those also.

Edit: after that, the Flying Scotsman scenario was a breeze :)

[Autist]

Making the Grade was a solid challenge.
Grades are difficult, but as long as there is a straight track between two cities, it is manageable. Engines do carry speed through grades well. Set up a line between Badlands and two nearby towns - was a straight one, Passenger expresses with Shays :D
Also a small food/goods chain, it was enough to keep the company prosperous and making surplus cash through depression. Later it was easy to expand. And when Camelback is available it is easy to make all the connections required.
Gold reached by 1946 - but could be done at least 10 - 20 years prior. The map becomes clogged with too many industries (5 coal mines in a single town, or 3 Alu mills appearing in a city at once...)
Electrics eased the process, but could be done with steam entirely. In the last years run Big Boys for fun.

Rainbow Droid - how exactly do you difficultize this?

[BigSilverHotdog]

Extensive knowledge of using the editor to manually make the map harder. I also know what is possible and what is impossible so I can manually make some of the more 'success-requires-luck' scenarios into equally hard (or harder) versions that rely less on blocking success with dice rolls. Just a personal thing. I absolutely hate randomness that negates strategy, in any game. Randomness that raises the difficulty level is great. Randomness that causes instant failure regardless of strategy or position is not.

Feel free to hit me up to get a copy of them (or if you'd like me to customize a map difficulty for you).

Obviously I can't post my modded maps publicly because most of them are private mods of publicly released maps. I will not disrespect the authors, even for a 20+ year old game.

edit: I can't examine my modified MTG versions at the moment but I will come back and update you when I have a chance to look.

edit2: Ok I looked but for some reason most of my edits aren't there. I may have wiped the last time I restarted the campaign but I'll have everything saved somewhere. I never throw out my Homm3 maps or my RRT2 maps. NEVAR!

[Autist]

Cascadia... that is one incredible map! Superb.
Complexity is stunning. Victory conditions, track limitations, and resoursce chains are fantastic.
Steam R&D story is great.
This map alone can bring days of fun, it's like undertaking a big project that needs to be made with careful planning.
Simply brilliant.

[trar]

To my knowledge, some of the maps linked in this thread are included in the Steam release. Still, there's some solid recommendations from the Dune forum too.