Days of Wonder's Ticket to ride Europe (board game).

I got this a couple months of go for our son who's 5. Its been out since 2004 but has great reviews unfortunately it is never really on special offer.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51gA6I2L5PL.jpg

It has been really good and we're all big fans in our household. I hold an unbeaten run of winning all the games we have played so far (about 5-6 games); quite literally the daddy.

From what I can gather there seem to be a number of tactics.

o Build your route as quickly as possible and draw more destination cards. You get through your trains quicker and end the game hope fully before everyone else has finished.
o Save up and build the ridiculusly train lines; the 6/7/8 routes for points. Spend all your time drawing cards form the pile; you mes sup the other players hands as they'll probably need cards you hold.
o Land grab all the small routes in the Balkans and around moscow; trying to monopolise the routes (I haven't tried this; it is a family game after all!)

Any seasoned pros out there willing to swap tactics or any other fans out there?

I've played the original US version of this a few times, although not for a while, it's a great game (better if you can play with all 5 players).

My tactics are to keep an eye on what routes everyone else is likely to go for (you get a feel for who's got what after you've played a few times). Even if it slows down your own building, a few pre-emptive grabs early on can scupper someone's direct routes, specially if you can get the common shortcuts or "necessary" portions of the longest routes. Also go for the single width lines if you can as it forces people to take difficult detours.

I find having too many destination cards isn't a wise choice as you get penalised for any you don't complete. Which can be a lot when you are trying to out-sneak people..

Don't have the board game, but if the family like it and you want a similar but quicker/easier to transport game for holidays etc. the Ticket to Ride card game is an absolute gem. Great for train journeys (seriously - you're playing a game about trains ... while you're on a train! how cool is that :D) as long as you've got a table, much easier to carry around, fixed length game - so much going for it.

That game is awesome, we have the orignial Ticket to Ride US version, we also have the USA 1910, Europe and India Expansion packs. The USA 1910 Expansion pack introduces a couple of extra playing modes like Big Cities and it adds so much more to the game.

For the USA maps my strategy is to try and pick as many cards as I can at the start but aim at finding cities that I can connect together as a single route so that I can also get the longest route bonus at the end of the game. I have had a single run that uses all 45 of my train pieces in one go.

The rules for the US maps are less complex with no tunnels, shared stations or ferry connections so it is easier for a younger child to play. Our six year loves the game though and it is great to play with the family.