No Caboose!

No Caboose! is a serious game with a whimsical name that takes about 2-3 hours to play.

No Caboose! is not an 18xx game. It is not a crayon game. It is a unique game about the early years of railroad building in the 19th century U.S., with six railroads along the Atlantic Coast poised to build their lines to the Midwest heartland. Its main feature is a more realistic stock market model than any other game. The stock market in No Caboose! includes the effects of supply and demand due to stock trading, it embodies the effects of the nation's changing economic climate. Watch stock prices soar during economic booms! Watch those stock prices plunge during economic Panics. Players can buy stock to pump the stock price, or sell stock to depress the price. Players may choose a strategy of holding a diversified portfolio with stock in many railroads, or put all their money into one or two railroads.

Another difference in No Caboose! is that players are not railroad presidents and are not bogged down in the detail running a particular railroad. Instead, players are financiers who arrange the routes railroads build and arrange the merger of small local lines into the bigger railroads. That is, players are in the role of banker J.P. Morgan, not the role of president Jim Hill. Players can help any railroad build a new line, which earns the player stock and money for arranging the new route.

A player's goal is simple. Being a financier, the only goal of a player is to be the richer than any rival financier at the end of the game.

There are important decisions for players to make every turn, and players must watch what their rivals are doing. There are subtle strategies in selecting routes to build, stocks to buy or sell, and opportunities can be seized or missed. No player is ever out of the game, and victory in most games is in doubt until the final tally.