OK, here's an entirely pointless (well, not entirely pointless) game you can play with your Ticket to Ride train cards.
Setup
Remove two of the Locomotive cards (the Jokers) so that there are the same number of each card, and shuffle all the cards together.
Turn over the top card of the deck and use it to form one discard pile.
Turn over the second card. If it is the same colour as the first one, put it on the first pile, the "same" pile. Otherwise form a second pile with it.
Turn over the third card. If it is the same colour as either of the first two cards, put it on the appropriate pile, to form the "same" pile. If it is different to them then choose a pile to place it in; this will be the “different” pile.
If there is still only one pile after three cards, then the second pile (the "different" pile) is considered to begin with 0 cards in it.
Deal twelve cards (minus one for each player over three) to each player and choose someone to be the first Active player.
Gameplay
On their turn the Active player must play a number of cards from their hand in front of them, declaring how many they are playing and what type (“same” or “different”). They collect up the last set of cards played from the appropriate pile (either “same” or “different”), counting them to be sure of how many there are, and place them into the main discard pile, and put their cards in the empty space. They then draw a number of cards from the top of the draw deck equal to the number of cards discarded – not the number of cards they just played. If there are not enough cards to draw, then the round ends automatically.
• The Active player may not play just one card from their hand.
• Locos are not considered wildcards but must be used as standard cards.
If they played all their cards out, then they don’t draw any cards but end the round instead.
Scoring
Players score according to the longest sets of cards they still have in their hand (either longest same colour or longest different colours.)
e.g. I have 4 reds, 2 blues and 1 green, so I score 4 (because my"same" set is longer than my "different" set.) You have 4 yellow, 2 green, 1 blue, 1 orange and 1 joker, so you score 5 (because your "different" set is longer than your "same" set.)
Play several rounds, with the lowest cumulative score being declared the winner.
