Solo: Major Banerjee

Play against Major Anil Banerjee using his card-driven freight priorities.

Set up the Major

Set up the 1–2 player board. You select a Setup card first, take ₹2, and receive its paired starting token and bonuses. The Major takes a random card from the remaining four and places his Freight Cars and turn-order marker as shown. He gets no starting card bonuses and no Goods or Transaction token. Give him an unused colour and the solo board, Cars, Crates, Market pawns, Financial Advisor, Performance and Investment markers.

Shuffle the Major’s eight Round 1 solo cards (four Load and four Move). Set the six Round 2 cards aside. The printed money on a solo card matters only when one of your actions compares cash. If you are first and no Major card has been played yet, treat his cash as ₹0.

Resolve a Major turn

Draw the top card and follow its actions from top to bottom. The card’s arrows show whether to load before moving or move before loading. When it shows a conditional Load-plus-Move sequence, the Major loads first only if he can load at least half the requested Crates, rounded up. Otherwise he moves first, then loads as many as possible.

Load priority

Place Crates one at a time in this order:

Major’s Large Freight Car.
Your Large Freight Car.
Major’s Medium Freight Car.
Your Medium Freight Car.
Major’s Small Freight Car.
Your Small Freight Car.

The Major can load your cars wherever they are. Continue down the priority once for each car; if Crates remain, start the list again. A car can be considered only once per pass. If multiple eligible cars share a section, choose which one gets the Crate.

Train movement priority

For each required move, find the next eligible train containing the prioritized car and move that train one section. The Major may move your car only if it carries at least one of his Crates. If two trains have the same priority, move the one closest to its destination; break ties as you choose. Pass down the priority list, then repeat it once if moves remain. Ignore a move if no eligible train can make it.

When a Major train moves, it joins the Major’s cars or Crates to another train if space allows and keeps them joined. It pushes a train if that train contains one of the Major’s cars or Crates. When it pushes a train made only of your cars carrying only your Crates into a junction, split that train.

Administration changes

Follow the regular Administration steps with these exceptions:

The Major gets no Transaction tokens or Regional Trading Posts from Shipping.
He pays no in-transit Crate penalty and receives no delivery income.
His Market pawns still align to their lowest pawn, but he gains no rupees.
In turn order, the Major places exactly three Investments if possible, each in a different row. He uses the leftmost open space, checks the top row first, and never stacks markers.

At the start of Round 2, shuffle the six Round 2 cards with the two unused Round 1 cards. Draw one card for each of his turns.

Solo score and variants

Use these score ranks after final scoring: 200 VP Young Businessman; 225 VP Promising Industrialist; 250 VP Famous Tycoon; 275 VP Master of Trade; 300 VP Titan of Industry.

The Rival variant adds one random challenge and target score: remove the two highest white and two lowest red Performance tiles (240); give the Major a second Large Car at the opposite city (240); remove West Trading Posts and replace them with another type (260); start the Major with Investments on spaces 40 and 24 (260); start all three Major Market pawns on value row 4 (280); or start the Major’s first and second rounds with a Crate on Ship III (280).

The Solo Campaign is three games: score at least 220 or 230 VP and meet a lower-row objective in game one; score 250 and meet an available middle-row objective in game two; score 270 and meet the top objective in game three. Choose the next path from the objective achieved. One missed score or objective ends the campaign. With the Leaders module, add 20 VP to each target because a Leader gives the human an extra advantage.