Switch & Signal

Game Idea and Goal

Together you manage the train traffic in Central Europe or North America, depending on which part of the map you are playing on. You have to pick up goods in different cities and transport them to the port of destination.

To do this you can make use of trains of different speeds, whose movement is determined by dice. With the help of your action cards you set switches and signals and let the trains run as desired. Helpers, which are available on each side of the game board, offer support through their special abilities.

At the beginning of each turn a driving instruction card is revealed, which determines whether new trains are deployed and which trains will move. The more trains come into play, the better you have to keep an eye on what is happening. If the last driving instruction is revealed, you only have your current turn left to reach your destination.

You win together as soon as you have delivered all goods to the port of destination.

Components

• 1x 2-sided game board
• 9x Trains (in 3 colors)
• 2x Deployment Dice
• 3x Movement Dice
• 12x Goods cubes (3 per color)
• 10x Signal discs
• 30x Switch Discs
• 100x Game cards:
  • 81x Action Cards (27 each of Set Signal, Change Switch, Move Train)
  • 18x Driving Instructions
  • 1x Starting Card
• 10x Time/Clock tokens
• 11x Location tiles
• 3x Cover Tiles

Game Setup

Before your first game, carefully remove all parts from the cardboard frames. The octagonal location tiles are only used for the variant.

1. For your first game you place the 26 switch discs and 8 signal discs as shown on the illustration: 1 switch disc is placed on each junction with 3 converging tracks. 2 switch discs are placed on each junction where 4 track lines meet.
2. 8 green signal discs are placed on red signal fields: on each city 1, 3 others randomly distributed on the routes/train tracks.
3. 8 goods cubes, 2 per color, are placed on the 4 colored matching cities. (i.e.: blue on Paris)
4. 7 time tokens are placed on the station clock.
5. The 9 trains are placed in the train depot on the color-coded fields of the game board.
6. The 2 deployment dice and 3 movement dice are put next to the board.
7. The 3 cover tiles are placed next to the 3 helpers.
8. The 18 driving instructions are shuffled, 2 cards are drawn at random and put back into the box. The remaining 16 driving instructions are placed face down on the corresponding field of the game board. The starting card is placed on top of this draw pile, face down.
9. The 81 Action Cards are shuffled face down and each player receives 5 cards, which form your hand of cards. The remaining cards are placed in a face-down pile on the corresponding field of the game board.
10. The last person that was held-up because of a freight train starts the game. If nobody was, the oldest player starts and becomes the first active player.

Game Turn Overview

The active player always performs these 3 actions in the specified order:

1. Reveal driving instruction
2. Play action cards
3. Draw new action cards

1. Reveal Driving Instructions

The player reveals the topmost driving instruction and lays it out in front of him. Then (s)he executes the symbols from top to bottom. The driving instruction indicates which trains (color) you have to move.

You must always move all trains that are on the rail network of the color shown. This includes trains in the cities and starting locations. Trains that are still in the depot will not move. On many driving instructions it is additionally stated that first a new train from the depot must be deployed.

Deploying a Train

If there is a front view picture of a train at the top of the card, you have to deploy a new train from the depot. You decide together on the color of this train.

Then the active player rolls the two dice and adds up the pips. The result gives the starting location for this train.

If there is already a train on this starting location, you do not deploy a new train. Instead you have to remove 2 time tokens from the station clock.

If you have to deploy a train and there isn’t one left in the depot, you also have to remove 2 time tokens. The more tokens you lose, the harder it will be for you to win the game.

Moving Trains

All trains of the shown colors must be moved by rolling the color-matching movement die. If there are several trains in this color, the active player determines the order in which the trains are moved. For each train (s)he must roll the dice separately.

If a multi-colored train is shown, you may decide from which color you want to move all trains. If two multicolored trains are shown, you have to choose two different train colors, of which you move all trains. This can also be a color from which all trains are still in the depot. You decide which color is moved first.

If all trains of the shown colors have been moved, the active player places the driving instructions card on the discard pile and may then play action cards.

2. Play Action Cards

In this phase the active player can play any number of his Action cards. (S)He may play all his action cards (which is quite common) or even none at all (which is more rare to occur). The following actions are available:

Set a Signal

The player sets a red signal to green. To do this, he moves a signal disc on the game board to a red signal field and thus unlocks the track.

Change a Switch

The player changes a switch. To do this, he may move one switch disc on a 3-way junction and both switch discs on a 4-way junction. He moves the discs so that the track is unlocked in the desired direction.

Move a Train

The player chooses any train (except trains in the depot) that (s)he wants to move. To do this, (s)he rolls the color-coded movement die and moves the train forward according to the movement rules.

Joker Action

By playing any 2 action cards, the active player may perform any of the 3 actions mentioned above.

Load a Train

If an empty train is in a city with goods cubes, the active player can load the goods into the train by playing any Action card.

The played action cards are collected face up in a discard pile next to the draw pile.

3. Drawing New Action Cards

At the end of his/her turn, the active player draws 5 Action cards from the Draw pile. If (s)he has kept any cards in hand, (s)he starts the next turn with more cards. A hand limit of 10 cards applies. If necessary, you must draw fewer cards or none at all.

If the draw pile is empty, shuffle the discard pile to make a new draw pile.

Then the next player in clockwise direction starts their turn by revealing the top driving instruction and then playing action cards,…

Movement Rules

1. A train can be moved for two reasons: either because of a driving/move instruction or a played action card “Move Train”.
2. In both cases, the active player rolls the corresponding colored movement die. The number on the die indicates the movement points and thus how far the train must be moved. Each track section and each city counts as 1 movement point. Signal fields and nodes are not counted.
3. If not all movement points can be used, you must remove 1 time token from the station clock for each movement point you lose.
4. A train always runs in the travel direction. If it is in a city, you can drive the train out in any direction – as long as the signal is green in that direction.
5. Only 1 train is allowed at a time on track sections, cities and starting points.
6. At switches, the train moves only in the authorized direction, switch discs block the movement.

7. You may only drive over green signal discs and must stop in front of red signal fields. (Remove Time Tokens if this reduces your actual movement (see 3)).
8. A train may not run into other trains, but must stop on the track section in front of it.

9. In goods cities and in the port city a train must stop. If movement points are lost, you do not lose any time tokens.
10. When a train reaches the port city, it returns immediately to the depot. If the train was loaded, it is unloaded beforehand and the goods are placed on the port’s color-coded storage area.
11. If 2 trains are driving/moving head-on, you must remove 2 tokens from the station clock for each expired movement point. The train that was moving will be returned to the depot. If it is loaded, the goods will be returned to the corresponding city.
12. If a train moves to a starting location, you lose 2 time tokens, regardless of whether and how many movement points remain unused. The train is then returned to the depot and a loaded good is placed back in the corresponding city.

Time Tokens

As soon as the last time token is removed from the station clock, the game is briefly interrupted. Now you have to take the top (facedown) card of the driving instructions draw pile and put it back into the game box without looking at it. With this you have one less driving instruction available. After this, all the time tokens return to the station clock.

Using Helpers

In the upper corner of each game board 3 persons are shown. Each of them brings an advantage, which may only be used once during the game. The active player may decide to use one or even more helpers in his turn. Since you can only use each helper once, you should coordinate your actions carefully.

After you have used a helper, place a cover tile on his or her symbol field. This helper is no longer available in this game.

Central Europe Helpers

Logistics specialist

A rolled movement die does not count. Instead, the active player rolls again. This second result must be used.

Scheduler

In this turn, trains may pass through all cities, provided the signals for this are set to green. But you may continue to stop in a city if this fits better into your planning, e.g. because the signal is not set to green on the track where you want to leave the city. However, it is not allowed to drive through a city with a “Move Train” card and loading a good by doing so.

Train Driver

All trains of a color shown on the driving instruction just drawn do not run/move.

Example: There are 3 black trains on the track. You can decide that no black train will move. It is not allowed to not move 2 black trains and then only move the other black train.

Winning and Losing

As soon as you have delivered the 8th and thus last goods cube to its port of destination, the game ends immediately and you have all won.

If the last driving instruction has been executed and the active player does not manage to bring the last goods to the port during his turn, you have all lost the game. Try again right away. Are you still unable to win you can adjust the difficulty level to make it a little easier.

Specific Rules for North America

Unlike the Central European map, there are 2 port cities on the North America map. You must bring 1 item of each color to San Francisco and 1 item of each color to New York.

But you can still stop in a city if this fits better into your planning, e.g. to load a good there.

However, it is not allowed to drive through a city and load up goods at the same time. To do this, you must play two action cards “Move Train” and any card to load the cube onto your train.

At the beginning of the game 9 signal discs are placed (6 at the goods and port cities and 3 on the tracks/routes). In the first game use the game setup as shown below.

All other rules known from the “Central Europe” board also apply to the North America side.

Helpers on the North America Map

Track manager / attendant

The driving instruction drawn is completely ignored. Put the card face-down at the bottom of the draw pile and reveal the next driving instruction. This one you must carry out.

Marshall / Shunter

Instead of rolling the deployment dice, you may choose the starting point where you want to deploy a new train.

Dispatcher

A single train, which is shown on the driving instruction just drawn, does not move. For example, if there are 2 black trains on the tracks, you can decide that one of them stops. But you have to move the other black train.

Adjusting the Difficulty

Making the Game Easier

• If you don’t succeed in winning – possibly after several games – you can place 1 additional signal disc on the game board at the beginning of a game.
• You can also decide to remove only 1 or even no driving instruction(s) from the game at the beginning.
• Should you still not win, you can increase the number of Time tokens that you have available before you need to remove a driving instruction. Place 8, 9 or even 10 tokens on the Station Clock.

Increasing the Difficulty

• If you have won the game and find it too easy, you can decide at the beginning of a game to put 1 additional driving instruction back into the box. If you are still successful, you can randomly select 2, 3 or more driving instructions.
• You can also decide before the game that you have to bring not 8 but 10 goods to the destination port(s). For this purpose, 3 goods of the corresponding color are placed on each goods city at the beginning. In order to win, you must bring 2 goods of each color to the destination port(s), as normal. In addition, you must deliver 2 more goods of any color. On the North America map, you have to deliver one of them to each port.

Game Variant – “The Location Tiles”

Variable Starting Locations

You can assign the numbers for the starting locations randomly. To do so, at the beginning of a game, mix the 11 location tiles, place them face down on the locations and turn them over. The location tiles remain on these places throughout the game. In this way, the starting locations now have a completely different chance of being used for trains.

Removing the Deployment Dice

Do you want to reduce the randomness when deploying new trains? Then put both deployment dice back in the box.

At the start, the 11 location tokens are mixed and three of them are randomly drawn. These determine successively the starting points for a black, brown and grey train. Then all 11 location tokens are mixed again and set aside as a hidden stack. If a train must be deployed due to a driving instruction, then the topmost location token is taken from the stack which determines the starting point of this train. This happens after you have chosen a train color.

Complete Game Turn Example

First the topmost driving instruction is revealed. The card shows that a new train must be deployed. The color of this train is chosen by all players. You decide to deploy a fast moving black train.

1. The active player rolls a 6 and places a black train from the depot onto Calais (start location 6). If a train had already been there, no new train would be deployed and instead 2 time tokens would be removed from the station clock.

   Then, as the driving instruction states, the dice are rolled first for each black train and then for each grey train. (Roll for each train individually!)

2. A 4 is rolled for the new black train. Since the signal is green, the train can enter the city with 3 movement points. For the excess fourth movement point, you do not have to remove a tile: in a city, you must always stop without losing any tokens.

After all trains on the driving instruction have been moved, the active player performs his actions. In his last turn, he played all but 1 card. Therefore he now has 6 cards available.

1. First he loads the black train in Paris by playing any Action card. He uses one of his cards “Move Train” for this.
2. Then he moves a green signal disc to Paris. He must make sure that at least 1 green signal is maintained in each city.
3. Next, the player adjusts the switch so that the black train now has free passage.
4. Afterwards he plays a card “Move Train”, rolls a 3 for the black train and moves it 3 track pieces along the free track.
5. Then he adjusts the switch he just passed.
6. He rolls a 4 for the brown train, by which he moves the train. Since he must stop at the red signal, 1 movement point must be forfeited and 1 time token must be removed from the station clock.

Finally, the player draws 5 new action cards from the draw pile. Then the next player in clockwise direction becomes the new active player and reveals the topmost driving instruction.